Gilbert, Daniel Todd

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Gilbert, Daniel Todd

PERSONAL:

Married; children: one. Education: University of Colorado at Denver, B.A., 1981; Princeton University, Ph.D., 1985.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Cambridge, MA. Office—Department of Psychology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Professor, social psychologist, and writer. University of Texas, Austin, assistant professor, 1985-90, associate professor, 1990-95, professor, 1995-96; Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, professor, 1996-2005; University of Chicago School of Business, Chicago, IL, Ford Visiting Professor of Behavior Science, 2003.

MEMBER:

Phi Beta Kappa.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Nell G. Fahrion Award for Excellence In Psychology, University of Colorado at Denver, 1981; Princeton University Merit Prize, 1981-83; National Science Foundation predoctoral fellow, 1981-84; Porter Ogden Jacobus fellow, Princeton University, 1984-85; Raymond Dickson Centennial Endowed Teaching fellow, University of Texas at Austin, 1987-88; President's Associates Teaching Excellence Award, University of Texas at Austin, 1990-91; National Institute of Mental Health Research Scientist Development Award, 1991-96; American Psychological Association Distinguished Scientific Award for an Early Career Contribution to Psychology, 1992; Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences fellow, 1991-92; Society for Personality and Social Psychology fellow, 1996; American Psychological Association fellow, 1997; Society of Experimental Social Psychology fellow, 1993; James McKeen Cattell Award, 1999; John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation fellow, 1999; American Philosophical Society fellow, 1999; Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize, Harvard University, 1999; American Psychological Society fellow, 2003; named one of the 20 Most Outstanding Professors by the Class of 2005, Harvard University.

WRITINGS:

(Editor, with Susan T. Fiske and Gardner Lindzey) The Handbook of Social Psychology, McGraw-Hill (Boston, MA), 1998.

(Editor) The Selected Works of Edward E. Jones, Wiley (Hoboken, NJ), 2004.

Stumbling on Happiness, Knopf (New York, NY), 2006.

SIDELIGHTS:

An aspiring science-fiction writer, Daniel Todd Gilbert dropped out of high school and attempted to establish a writing career for himself in Denver, Colorado. To improve his skills, Gilbert tried enrolling in a writing course at a local community college, but the class was full. The registrar suggested a course that was still open—psychology—and Gilbert signed up, believing that a working knowledge of aberrant behavior could be helpful as a writer. In an interview with Powells.com contributor David Weich, Gilbert shared the influence that the class ultimately had on him: "It was a bit of a revelation. It wasn't about crazy people. It was about all of us. What got me so excited was that psychologists seemed to be asking all the same questions I'd been asking myself my entire life—about mind and the nature of mind, about the nature of human experience, how we got to be who we are.… Suddenly I'd stumbled on this science where people were doing experiments, trying to get answers to philosophical questions." Gilbert went on to earn undergraduate and graduate degrees in psychology, focusing on the field of social psychology, or how a person's thoughts and behaviors are influenced by others.

Gilbert began his psychology career researching causal attribution, a theory in which a person's perceptions are shaped by what he or she believes to cause success and failure. In the early 1990s, however, a number of negative experiences befell Gilbert over a short period of time, and he was struck by a single observation: He was not nearly as unhappy as he would have imagined he would be. After several research studies designed to determine if others experienced a similar reaction to difficult times, Gilbert and colleague Tim Wilson confirmed their hypothesis that humans are not skilled at forecasting how they will feel under various circumstances. After publishing a paper detailing the results of their research, Gilbert went on to write a book on the topic, Stumbling on Happiness.

In a review for Booklist, June Sawyers described Stumbling on Happiness as "a sly, irresistible romp … full of startling insight, imaginative conclusions, and even bits of wisdom." A Kirkus Reviews contributor regarded the book as being "backed by solid research and presented with persuasive charm and wit." A contributor to Publishers Weekly noted: "Gilbert's playful tone and use of commonplace examples render a potentially academic topic accessible and educational." "Witty, insightful, and superbly entertaining" was how New Scientist reviewer Amanda Gefter described the book. Brett Hooton wrote in a review for Hour.ca: "This smart, funny and challenging book engages the reader's sense of wonder and, at its best, causes us to re-evaluate how we see ourselves.… Accessible and enlightening, representing scientific writing at its best."