The Career Contribution Award, established by SPSP in 2011, honors a scholar who has made major theoretical and/or empirical contributions to social psychology and/or personality psychology or to bridging these areas. Recipients are recognized for distinguished scholarly contributions across long and productive careers. One or two SPSP Career Contribution Awards may be given each year. The recipient receives a $1000 honorarium.
Past Recipients
2012
Samuel Gaertner
Phillip Shaver
2011
Thomas Pettigrew
Harry Triandis
Past Citations 2012 Samuel Gaertner. For more than a third of a century, Samuel Gaertner has been a major contributor to social psychology’s study of how to reduce intergroup prejudice, discrimination and conflict. Such widely used concepts as "aversive racism” and "common ingroup identity” derive directly from his extensive laboratory and field research. And, together with Jack Dovidio, Sam formed one of the most notable and productive mentor-student teams in the discipline’s history. Sam received his B.A. from Brooklyn College in 1964 and his Ph.D. from the City University of New York in 1970 where he worked with Stanley Milgram. As Professor of Psychology at the University of Delaware, he has served social psychology in multiple editorial roles. He has been a member of the editorial boards of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin and Group Processes and Intergroup Relations as well as the current co-editor of Social Issues and Policy Review. Not surprisingly, Sam’s important contributions have received repeated recognition – including the prestigious Kurt Lewin Memorial Award and twice (with Dovidio) the Allport Intergroup Relations Prize. Phillip Shaver. Professor Shaver is social psychology’s leading figure in research relating attachment theory to romantic love, couple communication, relationship loss, and grieving. Drawing on his initial insight that infant attachment theory should apply throughout life, Phil went on to demonstrate this point empirically and develop it theoretically. His brilliant and generative insight launched a major area of study within social psychology. In addition, his impactful contributions to the field of emotions include individuals’ and cultures’ cognitive representations of emotions and how conceptions of everyday emotions vary across cultures. Phil received his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in 1970 and has held faculty positions at Columbia, New York University, the University of Denver, SUNY Buffalo, and University of California, Davis, where he is currently Distinguished Professor of Psychology. Phil is the author of numerous research articles and books that have influenced the development of theory and research on both relationships and emotions, including a 2007 book (with Mario Mikulincer) on adult attachment. In addition, Phil has given tirelessly to the field through his many editorial responsibilities and leadership positions.
2011 Thomas Pettigrew. Professor Pettigrew is the author of several hundred research articles and books that have influenced the development of theory and stimulated laboratory and field research on topics spanning social comparison and relative deprivation to race relations throughout the world. He was an early and powerful force in social psychology’s focus on prejudice, intergroup relations, and intergroup contact. For more than 50 years, Thomas Pettigrew has been at the forefront of research on racial prejudice and intergroup relations, for which he has received numerous awards, including the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues’s Kurt Lewin Award and its Gordon Allport Award (twice). His work is distinguished by its emphasis on how racism and prejudice can be reduced through intergroup contact and changing social norms. He has conducted research in Europe, South Africa, and Australia, and his work has had worldwide impact on the growing field of intergroup relations. Not content to remain only in the academy, he has prepared materials for National Educational Television and other media outlets on race relations, and he has served as an expert witness in key desegregation cases. Thomas Pettigrew’s inspirational career is a model for those who would influence not only social psychology, but also the world it describes for the better.
Harry Triandis. Working tirelessly and enthusiastically, Professor Triandis pioneered the psychological study of culture. Long before others were convinced, he understood that culture matters for all aspects of behavior and demonstrated that it could be systematically analyzed using psychological tasks in the laboratory and the field. Among his most significant contributions is the theory that individualism and collectivism are distinct culturally derived frameworks that provide implicit and far-reaching scripts for behavior. Always seeking to foster cross-cultural appreciation and understanding, Harry Triandis has traveled the world presenting at international conferences, collaborating with scholars from around the globe, and training young scientists. Concerned with the practical application of his theorizing, he designed methods for cross-cultural training that reduce the shock among those encountering each others' culture for the first time, and edited the international volume of the Handbook of Industrial and Organizational Psychology. For his persistent efforts in internationalizing psychology, Harry Triandis has received numerous awards, including an honorary degree from the University of Athens, Greece, the American Psychological Association's Award for Distinguished Contributions to International Psychology,the Lifetime Contribution Award from the Academy of Intercultural Research in 2004, and was named an honorary fellow of the International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology.
Nomination Instructions Information about Nominations for 2013 will be posted here when available.
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