Roger Shepard, PhD

Shepard

Roger Shepard, PhD

In Memory Of… Roger Shepard

Honoring scientists who have made important and lasting contributions to the sciences of mind, brain, and behavior.

Roger Shepard, PhD (1929-2022)
Ray Lyman Wilbur Professor Emeritus of Social Science
Professor of Psychology, Emeritus
Stanford University

 

Roger Newland Shepard, the Ray Lyman Wilbur Professor Emeritus of Social Science and Professor Emeritus of Psychology at Stanford University, is honored for his profound, elegant, and numerous contributions to psychology and cognitive and behavioral science. His work spans several important domains of human cognition, including visual and auditory perception and representation, mental imagery, music cognition, learning, and generalization.

Shepard’s contributions encompass brilliant experimental work, such as his pioneering studies on mental rotation, key methodological advancements like non-metric multidimensional scaling, and fundamental theoretical frameworks such as psychophysical complementarity, second-order isomorphism, and the universal law of generalization. He has not only initiated new areas of experimental research but also created powerful illusions, including the ever-rising “Shepard Tones” and striking matching table tops. Additionally, he has developed essential tools for modeling mental representations spatially.

Among his notable books are “Mental Images and Their Transformation” (1982, with Lynn Cooper) and “Mind Sights” (1990).

Born in 1929 in Palo Alto, California, Shepard earned his bachelor’s degree from Stanford in 1951 and his PhD from Yale University in 1955. He subsequently worked at Bell Telephone Laboratories and Harvard before returning to Stanford in 1968, where he served on the faculty for over 30 years.

Shepard is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, as well as the William James Fellow of the American Psychological Association. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1977. In 2006, he was honored with the David E. Rumelhart Prize for his contributions to the theoretical foundations of human cognition, and in 1995, he received the National Medal of Science, the highest scientific award in the United States.

 

Individuals Honoring Roger Shepard:

Albert Bregman, McGill University
J. Douglas Carroll, Rutgers University
Laura L. Carstensen, Stanford University
Susan Chipman
Leda Cosmides, University of California, Santa Barbara
Jennifer J. Freyd, University of Oregon
George Furnas, University of Michigan
John Wesley Hutchinson, Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania
Peter R. Killeen, Arizona State University
* Steven M. Kosslyn, Harvard University
Gregory Lockhead, Duke University
Robert Nosofsky, Indiana University
Steven Pinker, Harvard University
* James Pomerantz, Rice University
John Tooby, University of California, Santa Barbara 

* The FABBS Foundation would like to thank Dr. Stephen Kosslyn and Dr. James Pomerantz for nominating Dr. Shepard for this honor and for leading the effort to spread the word about his nomination.

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