Richard Mayer
Professor, Psychology, UC Santa Barbara
Phone: 805-893-2472 Email:
Biography/Research
Richard E. Mayer is Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) where he has served since 1975. He received a Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Michigan in 1973, and served as a Visiting Assistant Professor of Psychology at Indiana University from 1973 to 1975. His research interests are in educational and cognitive psychology. His current research involves the intersection of cognition, instruction, and technology with a special focus on multimedia learning and computer-supported learning. He is past President of Division 15 (Educational Psychology) of the American Psychological Association, past Vice President of the American Educational Research Association for Division C (Learning and Instruction), former editor of the Educational Psychologist, former co-editor of Instructional Science, and former Chair of the UCSB Department of Psychological & Brain sciences. He is the year 2000 recipient of the E. L. Thorndike Award for career achievement in educational psychology, and the winner of the 2008 Distinguished Contribution of Applications of Psychology to Education and Training Award from the American Psychological Association. He was ranked #1 as the most productive educational psychologist in the world for 1991-2002 and for 2003-2008 by Contemporary Educational Psychology. He has received more than 30 extramural grants (as PI or co-PI), totaling more than $10,000,000, including funding from the Institute of Education Sciences, National Science Foundation, and Office of Naval Research. He currently is on the editorial boards of 14 journals mainly in educational psychology. He has served as an elected local school board member in Goleta, California since 1981. He is the author of more than 400 publications including 25 books, such as the Handbook of Research on Learning and Instruction (editor, with P. Alexander, 2011), Applying the Science of Learning (2010), Multimedia Learning: Second Edition (2009), Learning and Instruction: Second Edition (2008), E-Learning and the Science of Instruction: Second Edition (with R. Clark, 2008), and the Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning (editor, 2005).
