Thomas Marshall Ostrom (March 1, 1936 – May 16, 1994) was a
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 ...
who helped further the study of
social psychology
Social psychology is the scientific study of how thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the real or imagined presence of other people or by social norms. Social psychologists typically explain human behavior as a result of the r ...
. Prior to Ostrom, the field explored and identified the cognitive foundations of social activity. Ostrom pushed the field to studying the social foundations of cognitive activity.
Career
Ostrom was born in
Mishawaka, Indiana
Mishawaka is a city on the St. Joseph River, in Penn Township, St. Joseph County, in the U.S. state of Indiana. The population was 51,063 as of the 2020 census. Its nickname is "the Princess City". Mishawaka is a principal city of the South ...
. He received a bachelor's degree from
Wabash College
Wabash College is a private liberal arts men's college in Crawfordsville, Indiana. Founded in 1832 by several Dartmouth College graduates and Midwestern leaders, it enrolls nearly 900 students. The college offers an undergraduate liberal arts cu ...
in 1958 and a
Ph.D.
A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...
from the
University of North Carolina
The University of North Carolina is the multi-campus public university system for the state of North Carolina. Overseeing the state's 16 public universities and the NC School of Science and Mathematics, it is commonly referred to as the UNC Sy ...
in 1964. He joined the faculty of the
Ohio State University
The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publ ...
that same year, and remained there the rest of his life.
Ostrom was noted for his work advancing
attitude
Attitude may refer to:
Philosophy and psychology
* Attitude (psychology), an individual's predisposed state of mind regarding a value
* Metaphysics of presence
* Propositional attitude, a relational mental state connecting a person to a pro ...
theory and methodology. His work helped further the "ABC" tripartite model of attitudes (affect, behavior, cognition). He also furthered the field of attitude measurement with more valid and reliable rating scales. His research program on impression formation demonstrated the role of memory in social judgment.
In addition to his own work in the field, Ostrom was a talented administrator. In his thirty years at Ohio State, Ostrom helped develop the program into one of the premier graduate training programs in social psychology. He was the organizer of "social cognition week" at the Nags Head Conference Center and founder of the
Person Memory Interest Group
A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of propert ...
, developing both events into among of the key conferences in the field of social psychology. From 1980 to 1987 he served as editor of the ''
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology
A journal, from the Old French ''journal'' (meaning "daily"), may refer to:
*Bullet journal, a method of personal organization
*Diary, a record of what happened over the course of a day or other period
*Daybook, also known as a general journal, a ...
'', developing it into one of the most innovative journals in the field.
Thomas M. Ostrom Award
The Person Memory Interest Group honored Ostrom following his death by giving their highest annual award in his honor.
Ostrom Award winnersOstrom award: Previous winners
/ref>
*2015 -
Yaacov Trope
*2014 -
Patricia Devine
Patricia Grace Devine is a professor of psychology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where she was the psychology department chair from 2009 to 2014. She was also the 2012 president of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology.
Sh ...
*2013 - Jim Uleman
*2012 - Reid Hastie
*2011 -
John Bargh
John A. Bargh (; born 1955) is a social psychologist currently working at Yale University, where he has formed the Automaticity in Cognition, Motivation, and Evaluation (ACME) Laboratory. Bargh's work focuses on automaticity and unconscious proc ...
*2010 - Charles (Chick) Judd & Bernadette Park
*2009 - Donal E. Carlston
*2008 - Mick Rothbart
*2007 -
Marilynn Brewer
*2006 -
Russell Fazio
Russell Fazio is Harold E. Burtt Professor of Social Psychology at Ohio State University, where he heads Russ's Attitude and Social Cognition Lab (RASCL).Fazio, R. H. "Russ' Attitude and Social Cognition Lab page." http://faculty.psy.ohio-state.ed ...
*2005 -
Norbert Schwarz
Norbert Schwarz is Provost Professor in the Department of Psychology and the USC Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California and a co-director of the USC Dornsife Mind and Society Center.
Education
He received a Ph.D. in ...
& Fritz Strack
*2004 - Eliot R. Smith
*2003 -
Susan Fiske
Susan Tufts Fiske (born August 19, 1952) is the Eugene Higgins Professor of Psychology and Public Affairs in the Department of Psychology at Princeton University. She is a social psychologist known for her work on social cognition, stereotypes, ...
&
Shelley Taylor
*2002 - Steven J. Sherman
*2001 -
Anthony Greenwald
Anthony Galt Greenwald is a social psychologist and, since 1986, professor of psychology at University of Washington.
In 1959, Greenwald received a B.A. from Yale University. In 1961, he received a M.A. from Harvard University, and in 1963, he ...
*2000 - David L. Hamilton
*1999 -
E. Tory Higgins
Edward Tory Higgins (born March 12, 1946) is the Stanley Schachter Professor of Psychology and Business, and Director of the Motivation Science Center at Columbia University. Higgins' research areas include motivation and cognition, judgment and ...
*1998 -
Robert S. Wyer
Robert S. Wyer Jr. is a visiting professor at the University of Cincinnati and professor (emeritus) at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He received his doctoral degree from the University of Colorado. Wyer Jr.'s research interests cov ...
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ostrom, Tom
1936 births
20th-century American psychologists
Social psychologists
Wabash College alumni
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill alumni
1994 deaths
People from Mishawaka, Indiana