Linda B. Smith (born 1951) is a professor 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 ...

and Cognitive Science at

Indiana University Indiana University (IU) is a system of public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana. Campuses Indiana University has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration of IUPUI. *Indiana Universit ...

. Smith earned her Ph.D. from the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

in 1977. Smith is the author (or co-author) of more than 100 publications on

cognitive Cognition refers to "the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses". It encompasses all aspects of intellectual functions and processes such as: perception, attention, thought, ...

and linguistic development in young

children A child ( : children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person younger ...

. With

Esther Thelen Esther Thelen (May 20, 1941 – December 29, 2004) was an expert in the field of developmental psychology. Thelen's research was focused on human development, especially in the area of infant development. Thelen was also president of the Society ...

, she co-authored the books ''A Dynamic Systems Approach to Development'' (Smith & Thelen 1993) and ''A Dynamic Systems Approach to the Development of Cognition and Action'' (Thelen & Smith 1994), which look at development from a

dynamic systems In mathematics, a dynamical system is a system in which a function describes the time dependence of a point in an ambient space. Examples include the mathematical models that describe the swinging of a clock pendulum, the flow of water in a p ...

perspective. She is also well known for her research on the ''shape bias'' (Landau et al. 1988), children's tendency to generalize new concrete nouns on the basis of the shape of the object to which they refer. In 1997, she received the

Tracy Sonneborn Tracy Morton Sonneborn (October 19, 1905 – January 26, 1981) was an American biologist. His life's study was ciliated protozoa of the group ''Paramecium''. Education Sonneborn attended the Baltimore City Public Schools and graduated from ...

Award, Indiana University's highest award to its faculty. In 2007, she was elected to the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...

. In 2013 she received the

Rumelhart Prize The David E. Rumelhart Prize for Contributions to the Theoretical Foundations of Human Cognition was founded in 2001 in honor of the cognitive scientist David Rumelhart to introduce the equivalent of a Nobel prize for cognitive science. It is a ...

from the Cognitive Science Society. In 2019, she received the Norman Anderson Lifetime Achievement Award from the

Society of Experimental Psychologists The Society of Experimental Psychologists (SEP), originally called the Society of Experimentalists, is an academic society for experimental psychologists. It was founded by Edward Bradford Titchener in 1904 to be an ongoing workshop in which memb ...

. Smith is also a member of the Governing Board of the

Cognitive Science Society The Cognitive Science Society is a professional society for the interdisciplinary field of cognitive science. It brings together researchers from many fields who hold the common goal of understanding the nature of the human mind. The society prom ...

Selected publications

* * *

References

External links

Indiana University Cognitive Development Laboratory
Smith's laboratory 21st-century American psychologists American women psychologists Women cognitive scientists Developmental psycholinguists Fellows of the Society of Experimental Psychologists Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences University of Pennsylvania alumni Indiana University faculty Rumelhart Prize laureates Living people Fellows of the Cognitive Science Society American women academics 1951 births 21st-century American women 20th-century American psychologists {{US-psychologist-stub