Wiebke Bleidorn is a personality psychologist. She is a professor at the University of Zurich. [1] in the department of psychology. [2] She is president of Association for Research in Personality (ARP) until 2023. [3] She received the American Psychological Association's Award for Distinguished Scientific Early Career Contributions to Psychology in 2019. [4]
Linda B. Smith is an American developmental psychologist internationally recognized for her theoretical and empirical contributions to developmental psychology and cognitive science, proposing, through theoretical and empirical studies, a new way of understanding developmental processes. Smith's works are groundbreaking and illuminating for the field of perception, action, language, and categorization, showing the unique flexibility found in human behavior. She has shown how perception and action are ways of obtaining knowledge for cognitive development and word learning.
Mary Dinsmore Ainsworth was an American-Canadian developmental psychologist known for her work in the development of the attachment theory. She designed the strange situation procedure to observe early emotional attachment between a child and their primary caregiver.
Lisa Feldman Barrett is a Canadian-American psychologist. She is a University Distinguished Professor of psychology at Northeastern University, where she focuses on affective science and co-directs the Interdisciplinary Affective Science Laboratory. She has received both of the highest scientific honors in the field of psychology, the William James Fellow Award from the Association for Psychological Science for 2025, and the Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions from the American Psychological Association for 2021. Along with James Russell, she is the founding editor-in-chief of the journal Emotion Review. Along with James Gross, she founded the Society for Affective Science.
Neal Elgar Miller was an American experimental psychologist. Described as an energetic man with a variety of interests, including physics, biology and writing, Miller entered the field of psychology to pursue these. With a background training in the sciences, he was inspired by professors and leading psychologists at the time to work on various areas in behavioral psychology and physiological psychology, specifically, relating visceral responses to behavior.
Mahzarin Rustum Banaji FBA is an American psychologist of Indian origin at Harvard University, known for her work popularizing the concept of implicit bias in regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, and other factors.
John Terrence Cacioppo was the Tiffany and Margaret Blake Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago. He founded the University of Chicago Center for Cognitive and Social Neuroscience and was the director of the Arete Initiative of the Office of the Vice President for Research and National Laboratories at the University of Chicago. He co-founded the field of social neuroscience and was member of the department of psychology, department of psychiatry and behavioral neuroscience, and the college until his death in March 2018.
Ellen S. Berscheid is an American social psychologist who is currently a Regents professor at the University of Minnesota, where she earlier had earned her PhD in 1965. Berscheid conducted research on interpersonal relationships, emotions and moods, and social cognition. Berscheid wrote books, articles and other publications to contribute to the field of Social Psychology. She was involved in controversy surrounding the funding for her research on why people fall in love. In addition to her position at the University of Minnesota as a Psychology and Business professor; she has also held a position at Pillsbury. She has received awards for her contributions to social psychology, including The Presidential Citation and the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award from the American Psychological Association.
Laura E. Schulz is a professor of cognitive science at the brain and cognitive sciences department of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is the principal investigator of the Early Childhood Cognition Lab at MIT. Schulz is known for her work on the early childhood development of cognition, causal inference, discovery, and learning.
Ruth Kanfer is a psychologist and professor at Georgia Institute of Technology in the area of Industrial and Organizational Psychology. She is best known for her research in the fields of motivation, goal setting, self-regulation, job search, adult learning, and future of work. Kanfer has received numerous awards for her research contributions including the American Psychological Association Distinguished Scientific Award for an Early Career Contribution in Applied Research in 1989, the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) William R. Owens Scholarly Achievement Award in 2006 and the SIOP Distinguished Scientific Contributions Award in 2007. Ruth Kanfer has authored influential papers on a variety of topics including the interaction of cognitive abilities and motivation on performance, the influence of personality and motivation on job search and employment. and a review chapter on motivation in an organizational setting.
Simine Vazire is Professor of Psychology Ethics and Wellbeing at the University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. She was formerly Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Davis and at Washington University in St. Louis. She is a social and personality psychologist who studies how self-perception and self-knowledge influence one's personality and behavior. She obtained a PhD in the social and personality psychology program at the University of Texas at Austin.
Sandra L. Murray is Professor of Psychology at the University at Buffalo, State University of New York. She is a social psychologist known for her work on close relationships and their trajectories over time. Murray received the American Psychological Association Award for Distinguished Scientific Early Career Contributions to Psychology in 2003 for "distinguished and original contributions to an understanding of motivated social cognition in relationships." Other awards include the New Contribution Award from the International Society for the Study of Personal Relationships in 1998 and 2000, the Outstanding Early Career Award from the International Society for Self and Identity in 2000, the Career Trajectory Award from the Society of Experimental Social Psychology in 2012, the Mid-Career Distinguished Contribution Award from the International Association for Relationship Research in 2016, and the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities in 2020.
Robert Frank Krueger is Hathaway Distinguished Professor of Clinical Psychology and Distinguished McKnight University Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Minnesota. He is known for his research on personality psychology, clinical psychology, quantitative psychology, developmental psychology, personality disorders, behavioral genetics, and psychopathology. He is the co-editor-in-chief of the Journal of Personality Disorders.
The Association for Research in Personality is an American learned society dedicated to advancing research into personality. Its mission statement does not mention specific disciplines such as social psychology or policy research, instead simply emphasizing the scientific study of personality. It was established in 2001, with David Watson as the founding president. It originally held an annual preconference before the Society for Personality and Social Psychology's annual conference. In 2009, the ARP began holding its own annual conference.
Harry Charalambos Triandis was Professor Emeritus at the Department of Psychology of the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. He was considered a pioneer of cross-cultural psychology and his research focused on the cognitive aspects of attitudes, norms, roles and values in different cultures.
Wendy Johnson is an American differential psychologist and professor of psychology at the University of Edinburgh. She holds the chair in Differential Development in the Department of Psychology and Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh.
Monica R. Biernat is a social psychologist known for her research on social judgment, stereotyping, prejudice, and discrimination. She is a University Distinguished Professor of Psychology at the University of Kansas.
Catherine Lord is an American psychologist and researcher. She currently serves as a member of the International Advisory Board for The Lancet Psychiatry, as co-chair of the Scientific Research Council of the Child Mind Institute, and as the George Tarjan Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry and Education at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA.
The Distinguished Scientific Award for an Early Career Contribution to Psychology is an annual award that has been given by the American Psychological Association since 1974. It is given to outstanding research psychologists who are in the early stages of their career, defined as the first nine years after they receive their Ph.D. Every year, the award is given to five psychologists, each from one of ten different areas of psychology:
Daniel Ozer is a personality psychologist. He is a professor at the University of California, Riverside. He was president of Association for Research in Personality (ARP) from 2014 thru 2015. He has made significant contributions to understanding individual differences in personality and their impact on social behavior, and has received numerous awards for his work, such as the APA Distinguished Scientific Award for an Early Career Contribution to Psychology, as well as service to the profession.