Elaine Sandra Byers (born November 9, 1951) is a Canadian

psychologist A psychologist is a professional who practices psychology and studies mental states, perceptual, cognitive, emotional, and social processes and behavior. Their work often involves the experimentation, observation, and interpretation of how indi ...

, sex researcher, educator and therapist. As a faculty member of

psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychology includes the study of conscious and unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline of immense scope, crossing the boundaries betwe ...

at the

University of New Brunswick The University of New Brunswick (UNB) is a public university with two primary campuses in Fredericton and Saint John, New Brunswick. It is the oldest English-language university in Canada, and among the oldest public universities in North Americ ...

, she established the Muriel McQueen Fergusson Centre for Family Violence.

Early life and education

Byers was born on November 9, 1951, in

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...

. She attended

West Virginia University West Virginia University (WVU) is a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Morgantown, West Virginia. Its other campuses are those of the West Virginia University Institute of Technology in Beckley, Potomac State College ...

for her

Master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is an academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice.

and

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. albu ...

. Her PhD thesis was titled "Counselor Skill-Training in a Year-Round Therapeutic Wilderness Camp: Effect on Camper and Counselor Behaviors during Problem Solving Sessions."

Career

After graduating from the West Virginia University, she joined the faculty of

(UNB) and established their first human sexuality course in the Department of Psychology. One of her first research projects at UNB was to study stroke survivors opinions on sexual activities. She later became the founding director of the University's Muriel McQueen Fergusson Centre for Family Violence and co-edited "''Sexual Coercion in Dating Relationships.''" By 2003, she was elected Chair of the psychology department at UNB. In 2004, Byers and S. Andrea Miller conducted a study published in the Journal of Sex Research that concluded men in heterosexual relationships were often dissatisfied with the length of foreplay and intercourse. Two years later, Byers was named a University Research Scholar by UNB for her contributions to the study of human sexuality, sexual health and intimate partner relationships. In 2013, Byers was awarded the Alfred C. Kinsey Award by the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality. Later, Byers, Kaitlyn Goldsmith and Amanda Miller concluded that out of 107 men and 102 women, only 30 percent would choose to live life as the opposite gender. Byers' analysis of the results was that sexist beliefs and stereotypes played a role in the participants' answers. In 2018, she was elected a

Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada Fellowship of the Royal Society of Canada (FRSC) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Canada judges to have "made remarkable contributions in the arts, the humanities and the sciences, as well as in Canadian public life ...

and recognized by the Canadian Sexual Research Forum with an Outstanding Contribution Award.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Byers, E. Sandra 1951 births Living people Anglophone Quebec people Canadian women academics Canadian women psychologists Fellows of the Royal Society of Canada Sex therapists University of Rochester alumni Academic staff of the University of New Brunswick West Virginia University alumni Writers from Montreal 21st-century Canadian non-fiction writers