John Snarey | |
---|---|
Occupation(s) | Psychologist, academic and author |
Academic background | |
Education | B.S.Ed., Education and Psychology M.A., Religion and Culture Ed.M., Human Development and Culture Ed.D., Human Development and Psychology Post Doc., Psychiatry |
Alma mater | Geneva College Wheaton College Harvard University |
Academic work | |
Discipline | Psychology Education |
Institutions | Northwestern University Emory University |
John Snarey is a psychologist,academic,and author. He is a Senior Research Psychologist and the Franklin N. Parker Professor Emeritus in the Candler School of Theology and the Laney Graduate Department of Psychology at Emory University. [1]
Snarey is most known for his work in the social scientific study of human development,having done pioneering research on lifespan psychosocial development and generativity,on morality,moral development,and moral education,and the psychology of religion and faith development. [2] He has authored and co-authored research papers and books such as Race-ing Moral Formation,How Fathers Care for The Next Generation,and Conflict and Continuity. Additionally,he is the recipient of the 1988 AERA Outstanding Human Development Research Award,the James Moran Award for Exceptional Research in Family Relations and Child Development from the American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences (AAFCS) in 1994,the 2003 GSU Marie C. Keel Award for Excellence in Mentoring in Educational Psychology,the 2007 Albert E. Levy Scientific Research Award from Emory University [3] and the Association for Moral Education Kuhmerker Career Award in 2014. [4]
Snarey is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association (APA) [5] and the American Educational Research Association (AERA). [6] He was a Founding Cohort Member of the William James Society and has been a member of the William James Studies Editorial Board since 2005. [7]
Snarey earned a B.S. in Education with a concentration in Psychology from Geneva College in 1969 and an M.A. in Religion and Culture in 1973 from Wheaton College,where he became an instructor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology in 1974. Between 1975 and 1981,he worked as a Teaching Fellow at Harvard College and the Harvard Graduate School of Education,where he obtained an Ed.D. in Human Development and Psychology in 1982 and was awarded the Exemplary Dissertation Award from the National Council for the Social Studies and the Kuhmerker Dissertation Award from the Association for Moral Education. [4] From 1982 to 1984,he completed a Postdoctoral Clinical Research Fellowship in Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. [3]
Snarey held positions as a Research Associate at Harvard's Graduate School of Education and an Associate Research Psychologist at Wellesley College until 1985;he then served as an associate professor of Human Development and Education at Northwestern University until 1987,when he joined Emory University as an associate professor of Human Development and Ethics. He was promoted to full Professor in 1995 and was awarded a named chair,the Franklin N. Parker Professor of Human Development and Ethics,in 2014. He has been serving as Senior Research Psychologist and the Franklin N. Parker Professor Emeritus since 2023. [1]
Snarey was the Chair of the Department of Theology and Personality from 1994 to 1996 and subsequently assumed the role of Director of the Honors and Thesis Programs until 2001. In 2001,he was elected as the Chair of the Emory University Faculty Council and President of the Emory University Senate until 2005, [8] concurrently working as the Director of the Moral Cognition,Development,and Education Lab from 2004 to 2015. [9]
Snarey has contributed to the field of psychology by studying psychosocial development across the life cycle,the psychology of moral development and decision-making,and the psychology of religious and nonreligious faith development,using longitudinal,cross-cultural,and neuroimaging methods. [2]
Snarey has studied the psychology of the human life cycle throughout his career. In the book How Fathers Care for The Next Generation:A Four-Decade Study,he analyzed the role of fathers in children's development over four decades and generations,emphasizing social-emotional,intellectual-academic,and physical-athletic aspects,and defining characteristics of supportive paternal engagement. David Popenoe stated,"For those who hold the view that fathers are superfluous,or for anyone who wants to read an extraordinarily rich discussion of the importance of fathering,this book is strongly recommended." [10] He also investigated the coping strategies of married men facing infertility,finding that earlier coping methods predict later parenting resolutions and midlife achievement of psychosocial generativity. [11]
In response to Nancy Snow's retelling of Clarence Darrow's negative take on parental generativity,Snarey concluded that both modeling and reworking processes influence the course of generativity. [12] With Victoria Lasser,he examined how parent behavior influences ego development in adolescent girls during the transition to college,highlighting the importance of considering the dynamics within the father-daughter-mother triangle. [13]
Snarey researched the psychology of morality by analyzing moral education,moral development,justice and care ethics,with a theoretical focus on Lawrence Kohlberg's theories. [14] He reviewed cross-cultural research on moral reasoning,supporting Kohlberg's claim of universal moral development while noting biases and emphasizing the need for a developmental perspective on sociocultural systems. [15] In addition,in 1987 and 1988,he contributed to a two-volume set,which presented the system of classifying moral judgment built up by Lawrence Kohlberg and his associates over a period of twenty years. Georg Lind commented,"These volumes present an unprecedented methodology for understanding moral-cognitive development. Developmental,school and clinical psychologists will find it very useful." [16]
In 2004,with Vanessa Siddle Walker,Snarey co-edited Race-ing Moral Formation:African American Perspectives on Care and Justice,which examined moral development and education within the African American community,challenging existing notions and offering insights to promote moral reasoning and justice in schools. In a review for the Journal of the American Educational Studies Association,Sylvia Jones called it "a splendid center for academic discourse on marginalization". [17] He also worked alongside colleagues,using fMRI to show that moral sensitivity,essential for ethical decisions,correlates with specific brain activations,differing for justice and care moral issues. [18]
Snarey's work on the psychology of religion has focused on William James and his writings,especially the varieties of religious experiences,as well as on pragmatism,religious education,and faith development. Alongside Lynn Bridgers,he analyzed James' spiritual journey through his family history,emphasizing his father's conversion to Emmanuel Swedenborg's religious beliefs and how James' writing process contributed to his own moral and religious evolution. [19] With Katie Givens Kime,he proposed applying James' perspective to address reductionism in neuropsychological studies of religion,advocating interdisciplinary collaboration among neuroscientists,scholars,and psychosocial scientists. [20] Additionally,he and Joel McLendon analyzed William James's Gifford Lectures at the University of Edinburgh to understand them as separate performances,using first-hand accounts and a word-count method to illuminate James's perspectives and experiences during each lecture. [21]
Snarey's empirical studies of religion also used cross-cultural research methods. His cross-cultural study of faith development,as conceptualized by James Fowler,focused on the faith of Jewish non-theists in Israel and the United States,discovering tentative support for the legitimacy of Fowler's faith development model,and establishing that the construct validity of Fowler's model and measure was adequate for research purposes. [22]
Snarey's study of religious ethics in 186 societies paired the ideas of William James with those of sociologist Max Weber,revealing that environmental water scarcity predicted beliefs in a morally concerned supreme deity. [23]
Developmental psychology is the scientific study of how and why humans grow,change,and adapt across the course of their lives. Originally concerned with infants and children,the field has expanded to include adolescence,adult development,aging,and the entire lifespan. Developmental psychologists aim to explain how thinking,feeling,and behaviors change throughout life. This field examines change across three major dimensions,which are physical development,cognitive development,and social emotional development. Within these three dimensions are a broad range of topics including motor skills,executive functions,moral understanding,language acquisition,social change,personality,emotional development,self-concept,and identity formation.
Morality is the categorization of intentions,decisions and actions into those that are proper,or right,and those that are improper,or wrong. Morality can be a body of standards or principles derived from a code of conduct from a particular philosophy,religion or culture,or it can derive from a standard that is understood to be universal. Morality may also be specifically synonymous with "goodness","appropriateness" or "rightness".
Lawrence Kohlberg was an American psychologist best known for his theory of stages of moral development.
Carol Gilligan is an American feminist,ethicist,and psychologist,best known for her work on ethical community and ethical relationships.
Descriptive ethics,also known as comparative ethics,is the study of people's beliefs about morality. It contrasts with prescriptive or normative ethics,which is the study of ethical theories that prescribe how people ought to act,and with meta-ethics,which is the study of what ethical terms and theories actually refer to. The following examples of questions that might be considered in each field illustrate the differences between the fields:
Psychology of religion consists of the application of psychological methods and interpretive frameworks to the diverse contents of religious traditions as well as to both religious and irreligious individuals. The various methods and frameworks can be summarized according to the classic distinction between the natural-scientific and human-scientific approaches. The first cluster amounts to objective,quantitative,and preferably experimental procedures for testing hypotheses about causal connections among the objects of one's study. In contrast,the human-scientific approach accesses the human world of experience using qualitative,phenomenological,and interpretive methods. This approach aims to discern meaningful,rather than causal,connections among the phenomena one seeks to understand.
Moral psychology is a field of study in both philosophy and psychology. Historically,the term "moral psychology" was used relatively narrowly to refer to the study of moral development. Moral psychology eventually came to refer more broadly to various topics at the intersection of ethics,psychology,and philosophy of mind. Some of the main topics of the field are moral judgment,moral reasoning,moral sensitivity,moral responsibility,moral motivation,moral identity,moral action,moral development,moral diversity,moral character,altruism,psychological egoism,moral luck,moral forecasting,moral emotion,affective forecasting,and moral disagreement.
Lawrence Kohlberg's stages of moral development constitute an adaptation of a psychological theory originally conceived by the Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget. Kohlberg began work on this topic as a psychology graduate student at the University of Chicago in 1958 and expanded upon the theory throughout his life.
James William Fowler III (1940–2015) was an American theologian who was Professor of Theology and Human Development at Emory University. He was director of both the Center for Research on Faith and Moral Development,and the Center for Ethics until he retired in 2005. He was a minister in the United Methodist Church. Fowler is best known for his book Stages of Faith,published in 1981,in which he sought to develop the idea of a developmental process in "human faith".
The ethics of care is a normative ethical theory that holds that moral action centers on interpersonal relationships and care or benevolence as a virtue. EoC is one of a cluster of normative ethical theories that were developed by some feminists and environmentalists since the 1980s. While consequentialist and deontological ethical theories emphasize generalizable standards and impartiality,ethics of care emphasize the importance of response to the individual. The distinction between the general and the individual is reflected in their different moral questions:"what is just?" versus "how to respond?" Carol Gilligan,who is considered the originator of the ethics of care,criticized the application of generalized standards as "morally problematic,since it breeds moral blindness or indifference".
Character education is an umbrella term loosely used to describe the teaching of children and adults in a manner that will help them develop variously as moral,civic,good,mannered,behaved,non-bullying,healthy,critical,successful,traditional,compliant or socially acceptable beings. Concepts that now and in the past have fallen under this term include social and emotional learning,moral reasoning and cognitive development,life skills education,health education,violence prevention,critical thinking,ethical reasoning,and conflict resolution and mediation. Many of these are now considered failed programs,i.e. "religious education","moral development","values clarification".
James Rest was an American psychologist specializing in moral psychology and development. Together with his Minnesota Group of colleagues,including Darcia Narvaez,Muriel Bebeau,and Stephen Thoma,Rest extended Kohlberg's approach to researching moral reasoning.
Positive adult development is a subfield of developmental psychology that studies positive development during adulthood. It is one of four major forms of adult developmental study that can be identified,according to Michael Commons;the other three forms are directionless change,stasis,and decline. Commons divided positive adult developmental processes into at least six areas of study:hierarchical complexity,knowledge,experience,expertise,wisdom,and spirituality.
Values education is the process by which people give moral values to each other. According to Powney et al. It can be an activity that can take place in any human organisation. During which people are assisted by others,who may be older,in a condition experienced to make explicit our ethics in order to assess the effectiveness of these values and associated behaviour for their own and others' long term well-being,and to reflect on and acquire other values and behaviour which they recognise as being more effective for long term well-being of self and others. There is a difference between literacy and education.
Stephen Garrard Post has served on the Board of the John Templeton Foundation (2008-2014),which focuses on virtue and public life. He is a researcher,opinion leader,medical school professor,and best-selling author who has taught at the University of Chicago Medical School,Fordham University-Marymount,Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine (1988-2008) and Stony Brook University School of Medicine (2008-). He is widely known for his research on the ways in which giving can enhance the health and happiness of the giver,how empathy and compassionate care contribute to patient outcomes,ethical issues in caring for people with dementia,medical professionalism and the virtues,and positive psychology in relation to health and well-being. Post is an elected member of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia,the New York Academy of Medicine,and the Royal Society of Medicine,London. He was selected nationally as the Public Member of the United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) Composite Committee (2000-2005),and was reappointed for outstanding contributions.
James M. Gustafson was an American theological ethicist. He received an honorary doctorate by the Faculty of Theology at Uppsala University in 1985. He has held teaching posts at Yale Divinity School and the Department of Religious Studies (1955–1972),the University of Chicago as professor of theological ethics in the Divinity School (1972–1988),and Emory University as the Henry R. Luce Professor of Humanities and Comparative Studies. He retired in 1998 after 43 years of teaching and research,after being Woodruff Professor of Comparative Studies and of Religion in the Emory College and Graduate School of Arts &Sciences. He received the Lifetime Achievement Award for "creative and lasting contributions to the field of Christian ethics" on January 7,2011,at the annual meeting of the Society of Christian Ethics in New Orleans.
Moral development focuses on the emergence,change,and understanding of morality from infancy through adulthood. The theory states that morality develops across a lifespan in a variety of ways and is influenced by an individual's experiences and behavior when faced with moral issues through different periods of physical and cognitive development. Morality concerns an individual's reforming sense of what is right and wrong;it is for this reason that young children have different moral judgment and character than that of a grown adult. Morality in itself is often a synonym for "rightness" or "goodness." It also refers to a specific code of conduct that is derived from one's culture,religion,or personal philosophy that guides one's actions,behaviors,and thoughts.
Moral foundations theory is a social psychological theory intended to explain the origins of and variation in human moral reasoning on the basis of innate,modular foundations. It was first proposed by the psychologists Jonathan Haidt,Craig Joseph,and Jesse Graham,building on the work of cultural anthropologist Richard Shweder. More recently,Mohammad Atari,Jesse Graham,and Jonathan Haidt have revised some aspects of the theory and developed new measurement tools. The theory has been developed by a diverse group of collaborators and popularized in Haidt's book The Righteous Mind. The theory proposes that morality is "more than one thing",first arguing for five foundations,and later expanding for six foundations:
Darcia Narvaez is a Professor of Psychology Emerita at the University of Notre Dame who has written extensively on issues of character,moral development,and human flourishing.
Robert L. Selman is an American-born educational psychologist and perspective-taking theorist who specializes in adolescent social development. He is currently a professor of Education and Human Development at the Harvard Graduate School of Education,and a professor of psychology in Medicine at Harvard University. He is also known as the author of the 1980s G.I. Joe public service announcements.