CU Psychology and Neuroscience Distinguished Professor Steve Maier (Behavioral Neuroscience) has won the prestigious 2016 University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award for Psychology. From the Grawemeyer Awards website:
“The Grawemeyer Award in Psychology is given for original and creative ideas: ideas that possess clarity, power and that substantially impact the field of psychology. These ideas help us understand one another and the world around us, and provide insights into the human mind.
The purpose of this annual award is to acknowledge and disseminate outstanding ideas in all areas of psychological science. The award is designed to recognize a specific idea, rather than a lifetime of accomplishment.
His award-winning work concerns what makes one resistant or vulnerable to stress when bad things happen. Maier showed if test subjects had behavioral control over some element of the adverse event, they were less negatively impacted and also essentially ‘immunized’ against some harmful effects of future bad events, even if those events were uncontrollable. Through laboratory research studies, he uncovered in animal subjects the neural mechanism that provides such resilience in the face of trauma.”
Read more about the research for which he received the award on the Grawemeyer website. You can also read the CU press release.