- Roxane Cohen Silver
- William T. Riley
- Timothy Persons
- Baruch Fischhoff
- Saima Hedrick
- Vivian Tseng
- Sethuraman Panchanathan
- Philip Rubin
- Arthur “Skip” Lupia
- Mitch Prinstein
Roxane Cohen Silver is Professor in the Department of Psychological Science, the Department of Medicine, and the Program in Public Health, and Associate Director of the ADVANCE Program for Faculty and Graduate Student Equity, Diversity and Inclusion in the Office of Inclusive Excellence at the University of California, Irvine, where she has been actively involved in research, teaching, and administration since 1989. An international expert in the field of stress and coping, Silver has spent over four decades studying acute and long-term psychological and physical reactions to stressful life experiences, including personal traumas such as loss, physical disability, and childhood sexual victimization, as well as larger collective events such as terror attacks, war, and natural disasters across the world (e.g., U.S., Indonesia, Chile, Israel). Her research has been funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation, the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and the U.S. Public Health Service. She has guided governments in the U.S. and abroad in the aftermath of terrorist attacks and earthquakes and served on numerous senior advisory committees and task forces for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, providing advice to the Department and its component agencies on the psychological impact of disasters and terrorism. She has also testified at the U.S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Science, Space and Technology on two occasions and given several briefings to policymakers at the White House and on Capitol Hill on the role of social and behavioral science research in disaster preparedness and response and the impact of the media following disasters.
Silver is the President of the Federation of Associations in Behavioral & Brain Sciences (FABBS) and was the 2016 President of the Society of Experimental Social Psychology. She was also a founding Director and Chair of the Board of Directors of Psychology Beyond Borders, an international nonprofit organization that facilitated research, intervention, and policy development in the prevention, preparedness, and response to terror attacks, conflict, or natural disasters across the world. She is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association (in 4 Divisions), the Association for Psychological Science, the Academy of Behavioral Medicine Research, and the Society of Experimental Social Psychology. Silver has received a number of awards for her scholarship and service, including the 2007 American Psychological Association’s Award for Distinguished Service to Psychological Science, the 2010 Public Advocacy Award from the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies (for “outstanding and fundamental contributions to advancing social understanding of trauma”), the American Psychological Association’s 2011 Award for Distinguished Contributions to Psychology in the Public Interest (Senior Career), the 2011 Award for Outstanding Service to the Field of Trauma Psychology, the 2014 International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies’ Frank Ochberg Award for Media and Trauma Study, the 2016 Social Responsibility Award from the Western Psychological Association, the 2018 Robert S. Laufer Memorial Award for Outstanding Scientific Achievement from the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, the 2019 Application of Personality and Social Psychology Senior Career Contribution Award from the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, and the 2020 Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Field of Trauma Psychology from Division 56 (Trauma Psychology) of the American Psychological Association.
Silver is also a dedicated teacher and active mentor of predoctoral and postdoctoral students. In recognition of her efforts toward graduate and undergraduate education, she has received almost two dozen teaching/mentoring awards over her career, including the 2012 Distinguished Mentorship Award from the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, UC Irvine’s 2001 Distinguished Faculty Lectureship Award for Teaching (the 16th recipient in UCI’s history), and UCI’s inaugural Tom Angell Fellowship Faculty Award for Mentoring in 2015. Silver received her Ph.D. in social psychology from Northwestern University.
William T. Riley was appointed Associate Director for Behavioral and Social Sciences Research, and Director of the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research (OBSSR) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in August, 2015. Under his leadership, the OBSSR instituted its third and current strategic plan, which reflects key research challenges that the Office is uniquely positioned to address over the next five years, along with four foundational processes to enhance and support these scientific priorities as well as the OBSSR’s broader mission.
Since joining the NIH in 2005, Dr. Riley has served in extramural leadership positions at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), and the National Cancer Institute (NCI). He has contributed to several trans-NIH initiatives including serving as Chief Science Officer for the Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS) and as NIH Interim Deputy Director of the Precision Medicine Initiative (PMI, now called the All of Us Research Program). He has been the recipient of several NIH Director’s Awards including recognition for his work on the PROMIS and PMI initiatives.
Dr. Riley received his undergraduate degree in Psychology and Sociology from James Madison University, and his M.S. and Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Florida State University. He interned in Medical Psychology at Baylor College of Medicine. He has served on the faculty of the Medical College of Georgia and Virginia Commonwealth University. After 15 years in academic medical schools, he became Director of Research at PICS, Inc., a health behavior research and development firm. Dr. Riley holds an appointment as Professorial Lecturer in the School of Public Health at The George Washington University.
Dr. Riley’s research has contributed significantly to the behavioral and social sciences, particularly in the application of digital technologies to behavioral assessment and intervention. Among his over 130 publications, he published the first application of text messaging for smoking cessation, and a highly cited article on the limitations of current health behavior theories to mobile health (mHealth) interventions.
Timothy M. Persons is the Chief Scientist and Managing Director of the
Science, Technology Assessment, and Analytics team of the United States
Government Accountability Office (GAO – the oversight, insight, and foresight entity
of the U.S. Congress). Dr. Persons is the founder of GAO’s Innovation Lab – an exploratory research and development environment for advanced data analytic activities as well as the exploration of emerging technologies such as machine learning systems, blockchain, and cloud cybersecurity research at GAO. He also is the managing executive director of GAO’s science, technology, and engineering portfolio – including technology assessment, technical assistance, and engineering in support of the Congress and GAO. In these roles he leads a large interdisciplinary technical team that advises Congress, generates policy options, and informs legislation on topics in the computational sciences (such as artificial intelligence and advanced data analytics), physical sciences (such as sustainable chemistry and nuclear waste management), life sciences (such as epidemiology of emerging infectious diseases and biosurety of Select Agents), and engineering (such as IoT, 3D printing, and hypersonic systems). He also directed the production and release of GAO’s Best Practices Guides – Cost, Schedule, Technology Readiness Assessment, and Agile Software Development. Prior to joining GAO, Dr. Persons served as the Technical Director for the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity
(IARPA) as well as the technical lead for Quantum Information Sciences and Biometrics research groups for
the Information Assurance Directorate at the National Security Agency.
Dr. Persons is a recipient of a 2020 Fed 100 Award in recognition of national AI/ML leadership, a 2016 James
Madison University (JMU) Distinguished Alumnus Award, a 2014 recipient of a GAO Distinguished Service
Award, a 2012 recipient of the Arthur S. Flemming award in recognition of sustained outstanding and
meritorious achievement within the U.S. federal government; and a 2019, 2012, and 2010 recipient of GAO’s
Big Picture Award for significant project achievement involving the ability to look longer, broader, and more
strategically at key national or global issues. In 2007, Dr. Persons was awarded a Director of National
Intelligence Science and Technology Fellowship focusing on computational imaging systems research. He was
also selected as the JMU Physics Alumnus of 2007.
Dr. Persons received his B.Sc. (Physics) from JMU, a M.Sc. (Nuclear Physics) from Emory University, and
M.Sc. (Computer Science) and Ph.D. (Biomedical Engineering) degrees from Wake Forest University. He is a
senior member of the Institute for Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), a council member (ex officio) of
the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine’s (NASEM) Government-University-Industry
Research Roundtable (GUIRR), a member (ex officio) of the National Academy of Medicine’s Committee on
Emerging Science, Technology, and Innovation, and a member of the Virginia Tech-Wake Forest University
Biomedical Engineering and Mechanics (BEAM) Advisory Board.
Baruch Fischhoff is the Howard Heinz University Professor in the Department Engineering and Public Policy and Institute for Politics and Strategy at Carnegie Mellon University. A graduate of the Detroit Public Schools, he holds a B.Sc. in mathematics and psychology from Wayne State University and an M.A. and Ph.D. in psychology from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Dr. Fischhoff is the past President of the Society for Judgment and Decision Making and of the Society for Risk Analysis, and recipient of its Distinguished Achievement Award. He was founding chair of the Food and Drug Administration Risk Communication Advisory Committee and chaired the National Research Council Committee on Behavioral and Social Science Research to Improve Intelligence Analysis for National Security and co-chaired the National Research Council Committee on Future Research Goals and Directions for Foundational Science in Cybersecurity and three National Academy of Sciences Colloquia on “The Science of Science Communication.” He is a former member of the Eugene, Oregon Commission on the Rights of Women, Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Advisory Committee, the World Federation of Scientists Permanent Monitoring Panel on Terrorism, and the Environmental Protection Agency Science Advisory Board, where he chaired the Homeland Security Advisory Committee. He is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association (APA), the Association for Psychological Science, the Society of Experimental Psychologists, and the Society for Risk Analysis. He has received APA’s Award for Distinguished Service to Psychology, an honorary Doctorate of Humanities from Lund University, an Andrew Carnegie Fellowship, and Carnegie Mellon’s Ryan Award for Teaching.
He has co-authored or edited, Acceptable Risk (1981), A Two-State Solution in the Middle East: Prospects and Possibilities (1993), Elicitation of Preferences (2000), Risk Communication: A Mental Models Approach (2002), Intelligence Analysis: Behavioral and Social Science Foundations (2011), Risk: A Very Short Introduction (2011), Communicating Risks and Benefits: An Evidence-Based Guide (2011), Judgment and Decision Making (2011), Risk Analysis and Human Behavior (2011), The Science of Science Communication I (2013), II (2014), and III (2019), and Counting Civilian Casualties (2013).
Saima K. Hedrick is the Executive Director of the Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD). In this role, her responsibilities include overseeing all staff and business operations of the Society, working in partnership with Governing Council, Committees, and Caucuses to further SRCD’s Strategic Goals, and representing SRCD’s interests in collaborations with sister associations and societies. Hedrick comes to SRCD directly from the Society for the Study of Reproduction (SSR), an association of scientists and physicians that promotes the study of reproduction by fostering interdisciplinary communication among members. She served as executive director of this 1,300-member association for more than three years, overseeing core activities including conferences and meetings and the publication of its official journal. Well-versed in association management for a scientific organization, Saima brings more than a decade of experience and certifications in association leadership. Saima is also a strong advocate for maternal and child health. In her early career, she trained patients and caregivers on the process of scientific peer review for orphan diseases, many of which were pediatric. She is a Certified Association Executive (CAE) and an ASAE 2017-2019 Diversity Executive Leadership Program (DELP) Scholar. She has a Bachelors in Biology and a Masters in Public Health from George Mason University.
Vivian Tseng is the Senior Vice President, Program at the William T. Grant Foundation. She leads the Foundation’s programs, grantmaking operations, and initiatives to connect research, policy, and practice to improve child and youth outcomes. In 2009, she launched the Foundation’s initiative on the use of research evidence in policy and practice. That program has generated over 50 funded studies and informed the grantmaking programs of private and public funders across the country. She has been instrumental in the expanding field of research-practice partnerships in the United States, including the creation of field-defining resources and the National Network of Education Research-Practice Partnerships.
Tseng has long standing interests in racial equity in higher education and philanthropy. Under her leadership, the Foundation has strengthened its internal diversity, equity, and inclusion work, increased its grantmaking and capacity support to underrepresented researchers, and developed a program to support stronger mentoring relationships for graduate students of color.
She regularly writes and speaks to international and domestic audiences on evidence-informed policy and practice. Her studies of racial, cultural, and immigration influences on child development have been published in Child Development and her research on improving social settings and promoting social change have appeared in the American Journal of Community Psychology. She received her Ph.D. from NYU and her B.A. from UCLA. She serves on the Boards of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in Philanthropy, Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees, and the Coalition for Asian American Children and Families. She was previously on the faculty in Psychology and Asian American studies at CSUN as well as North American Editor for Evidence & Policy.
The Honorable Sethuraman Panchanathan is a computer scientist and engineer and the 15th director of the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF). Dr. Panchanathan was nominated to this position by the President of the United States in 2019 and subsequently unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate on June 18, 2020. NSF is an $8.5B independent federal agency and the only government agency charged with advancing all fields of scientific discovery, technological innovation and STEM education.
Dr. Panchanathan is a leader in science, engineering and education with more than three decades of experience. He has a distinguished career in both higher education and government, where he has designed and built knowledge enterprises, which advance research innovation, strategic partnerships, entrepreneurship, global development and economic growth.
Dr. Panchanathan previously served as the executive vice president of the Arizona State University (ASU) Knowledge Enterprise, where he was also chief research and innovation officer. He was also the founder and director of the Center for Cognitive Ubiquitous Computing at ASU. Under his leadership, ASU increased research performance fivefold, earning recognition as the fastest growing and most innovative research university in the U.S.
Prior to joining NSF, Dr. Panchanathan served on the National Science Board as chair of the Committee on Strategy and as a member of the External Engagement and National Science and Engineering Policy committees. Additionally, he served on the National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship. He was chair of the Council on Research of the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities and co-chair of the Extreme Innovation Taskforce of the Global Federation of Competitiveness Councils. Arizona’s Governor appointed Panchanathan as senior advisor for science and technology in 2018. He was the editor-in-chief of the IEEE Multimedia Magazine and editor/associate editor of several international journals.
His scientific contributions have advanced the areas of human-centered multimedia computing, haptic user interfaces, person-centered tools and ubiquitous computing technologies for enhancing the quality of life for individuals with different abilities; machine learning for multimedia applications; medical image processing; and media processor designs. He has published close to 500 articles in refereed journals and conference proceedings, and has mentored more than 150 graduate students, postdocs, research engineers and research scientists, many now occupy leading positions in academia and industry.
For his scientific contributions, Panchanathan has received numerous awards, such as Distinguished Alumnus Awards and the Governor’s Innovator of the Year for Academia Award for his development of information technology centric assistive and rehabilitative environments to assist individuals with visual impairments.
Dr. Panchanathan is a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, where he also served as vice president for strategic initiatives. He is also a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Canadian Academy of Engineering, the Association for Computing Machinery, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and the Society of Optical Engineering.
Philip Rubin is the 2022 President of FABBS and Chief Executive Officer emeritus and a former Senior Scientist at Haskins Laboratories. He is also an adjunct professor in the Department of Surgery, Otolaryngology, at Yale School of Medicine, Research Affiliate in Psychology at Yale, and Fellow at Yale’s Trumbull College. In December 2017, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy appointed Dr. Rubin to serve as a member of the UConn Board of Trustees, the governing body for the University of Connecticut. From 2012 -2015, Rubin was Principal Assistant Director for Science at OSTP, led the White House neuroscience initiative, and was co-chair of the NSTC Committee on Science. His research spans a number of disciplines, combining computational, engineering, linguistic, physiological, and psychological approaches to study embodied cognition, most particularly the biological bases of speech and language.
Arthur “Skip” Lupia studies decision making and learning. He uses this information to explain to convey complex ideas to diverse audiences. His work clarifies how information and institutions affect policy and politics and how people make decisions when they lack information. He draws from multiple scientific and philosophical disciplines and uses multiple research methods. His topics of expertise include information processing, persuasion, strategic communication, and civic competence.
He works with many groups to improve decision-making and the communication of scientific facts. He is Chair of the National Research Council’s Roundtable on the Application of Social and Behavioral Science Research. He serves on the boards of organizations dedicated to increasing the social value of scientific research including the Center for Open Science, the National Academies’ Advisory Board on the Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s Leshner Leadership Institute. He has served as Chair of the AAAS Section on Social, Economic, and Political Sciences, President of the Midwest Political Science Association, and a range of leadership positions at the American Political Science Association including Treasurer and Chair of the Task Force on Public Engagement.
Dr. Lupia also has developed new means for researchers to better serve science and society. As a founder of TESS (Time-Sharing Experiments in the Social Sciences), he has helped hundreds of scientists from many disciplines run innovative experiments on opinion formation and change using nationally representative subject pools. As a Principal Investigator of the Principal Investigator of the American National Election Studies, he brought many methodological innovations to the study that increased its usefulness and credibility. He helped to design the EITM Summer Institutes and currently serves as its lead PI.
He is an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and an elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He has been a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow, a fellow at the Center for the Study of Behavioral and Social Sciences, and is one of the inaugural Andrew Carnegie Fellows. His awards include the American Political Science Association’s Ithiel de Sola Pool Award, the American Association for Public Opinion Research’s Mitovsky Innovator’s Award, and the National Academy of Sciences’ Initiatives in Research Award.
His articles appear in political science, economics, and law journals, and his editorials are published in leading newspapers. His research has been supported by a wide range of groups including the World Bank, the Public Policy Institute of California, the Markle Foundation, and the National Science Foundation. In 2016, Oxford University Press released his latest book, Uninformed: Why People Know So Little About Politics and What We Can Do About It.
Mitchell J. Prinstein is the Chief Science Officer (CSO) at the American Psychological Association (APA), responsible for leading the association’s science agenda and advocating for the application of psychological research and knowledge in settings including academia, government, industry, and the law.
Before assuming the CSO post, he was the John Van Seters distinguished professor of psychology and neuroscience, and assistant dean of Honors Carolina at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He joined the department of psychology and neuroscience faculty at UNC-Chapel Hill in 2004 as an associate professor, rising to full professor in 2008. He began his academic career in 1999 as an assistant professor and later director of clinical psychology at the Yale University department of psychology.
A longtime leader in promoting psychological science, Dr. Prinstein has an extensive record of professional service, including as an elected member of the executive committee of the Coalition for the Advancement and Application of Psychological Science. This is a group of 12 national associations, including APA, that are committed to the public dissemination of psychological science and the promotion of science-based graduate training in the United States.
Dr. Prinstein previously served on APA’s Board of Directors as an at-large member and was active in APA governance beginning as chair of the American Psychological Association of Graduate Students (APAGS). He was the first APAGS representative to the APA Board, and later served as the first chair for the Committee on Early Career Psychologists and as a member of the Good Governance Group. He also has been president of the Society for a Science of Clinical Psychology, president of the Society for Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology and editor of the Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology.
With continuous funding from the National Institutes of Health for over 20 years, Prinstein has published more than 150 scientific articles and nine books, including a set of encyclopedias on adolescent development, textbooks for both graduate and undergraduate education in psychology, and two professional development volumes for graduate students. His developmental psychopathology research has focused on popularity and peer relations, particularly among adolescents. He also has examined the associations between adolescents’ interpersonal experiences and psychological symptoms, including depression, self-injury, suicidal behavior, and other health-risk behaviors.
Beyond his work as an academic, Dr. Prinstein is skilled in translating psychological science for a general audience. He is author of the mass-market book Popular: Finding Happiness and Success in a World That Cares Too Much About the Wrong Kinds of Relationships and has written for or been interviewed by hundreds of mainstream media outlets to elevate the impact of psychological science.
