AMES, Iowa -- Iowa State University Distinguished Professor of Psychology Craig Anderson was the second-most cited scholar in social psychology textbooks published in 2004 and 2005, according to a study by ISU graduate student Nathan Engelberth that was published in the Spring 2006 edition of Dialogue, the official newsletter of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (www.spsp.org).
Craig Anderson
Gary Wells
Gary Wells, Distinguished Professor of liberal arts and sciences and professor of psychology at Iowa State, was the 22nd-most cited scholar in social psychology textbooks published in 2005 -- making Iowa State one of just five institutions that had at least two scholars in one of the top 30 citation lists in 2004 or 2005, respectively. ISU joined the University of Michigan, University of Minnesota, The Ohio State University, and Stanford University on that list.
"This ranking signifies the impact that research by Distinguished Professors Anderson and Wells is having on scholars in the field. Through these textbooks, their work will reach thousands, perhaps millions, of students," said Iowa State University President Gregory Geoffroy.
Last fall, Engelberth chose texts with publication dates of 2004 or 2005 from the Social Psychology Network (www.socialpsychology.org) list of texts.
Engelberth's research found that Anderson was cited 158 times in the six textbooks listed at the time -- second only to Alice H. Eagly of Northwestern University. Anderson was second to Eagly among 2005 textbook citations with 97, and was fourth among 2004 texts with 61. Wells had 57 citations among 2005 textbooks.
Anderson is regarded as one of the nation's top scholars on the effects of violent video games on children, while Wells has conducted groundbreaking research on eyewitness identification.
"Gary Wells and I are quite pleased that textbook authors have found our research so useful, and that our respective research programs are having such a wide impact on the current generation of college students," said Anderson. "Of course, all of the faculty members in our department continually produce top quality basic research that has important applications to real world problems."
A complete copy of Engelberth's paper (PDF file) can be accessed online.