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Laurence Steinberg, Ph.D

Laurence Steinberg, Ph.D., is the Distinguished University Professor and Laura H. Carnell Professor of Psychology at Temple University. Dr. Steinberg has taught previously at Cornell University, the University of California at Irvine, and the University of Wisconsin at Madison. He was educated at Vassar College, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and graduated with honors and distinction in psychology in 1974; and at Cornell University, where he received his Ph.D. in human development and family studies in 1977. He is a fellow of the American Psychological Association, has been a Faculty Scholar of the William T. Grant Foundation, and was Director of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Adolescent Development and Juvenile Justice. Dr. Steinberg is a former President of the Division of Developmental Psychology of the American Psychological Association and of the Society for Research on Adolescence, the major professional organization of social and behavioral scientists interested in adolescent growth and development. He has been the recipient of numerous honors, including the John P. Hill Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Study of Adolescence, given by the Society for Research on Adolescence, the Society for Adolescent Medicine’s Gallagher Lectureship, and three lifetime achievement awards from the American Psychological Association: the Urie Bronfenbrenner Award for Lifetime Contribution to Developmental Psychology in the Service of Science and Society, the APA Award for Distinguished Contribution to Research in Public Policy, and the APA Presidential Citation.

A nationally recognized expert on psychological development during adolescence, Dr. Steinberg’s research has focused on a range of topics in the study of contemporary adolescence, including parent-adolescent relationships, adolescent employment, high school reform, and juvenile justice. His work has been funded by a variety of public and private organizations, including the National Institutes of Health, the U.S. Department of Education, the U.S. Department of Justice, the MacArthur Foundation, the William T. Grant Foundation, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Ford Foundation, and the Lilly Endowment. Dr. Steinberg served as a member of the National Academies’ Panel on the Health Implications of Child Labor, the Committee on Adolescent Health and Development, and the Board on Children Youth, and Families, and currently chairs the Academies’ Committee on the Science of Adolescence. He has been a frequent consultant to state and federal agencies and lawmakers on child labor, secondary education, and juvenile justice policy. He is the author of more than 250 articles and essays on growth and development during the teenage years, and the author or editor of ten books, including Adolescence, the leading college textbook on adolescent development, now in its eighth edition (McGraw-Hill, 2008), When Teenagers Work: The Psychological and Social Costs of Adolescent Employment (with Ellen Greenberger; Basic Books, 1986), You and Your Adolescent: A Parent’s Guide for Ages 10 to 20 (with Ann Levine; HarperCollins,1997), Crossing Paths: How Your Child’s Adolescence Triggers Your Own Crisis (with Wendy Steinberg; Simon & Schuster, 1994), Beyond the Classroom: Why School Reform Has Failed and What Parents Need to Do (with Bradford Brown and Sanford Dornbusch; Simon & Schuster, 1996), Studying Minority Adolescents: Conceptual, Methodological, and Theoretical Issues (co-edited with Vonnie McLoyd; Erlbaum, 1998), the Handbook of Adolescent Psychology, 3rd edition (co-edited with Richard Lerner; Wiley, 2009), The Ten Basic Principles of Good Parenting (Simon & Schuster, 2004), and Rethinking Juvenile Justice (co-authored with Elizabeth Scott; Harvard University Press, 2008).
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