Barbara Tversky

Professional Background
Vitae
Courses
Papers
In the News

Professional Background

Educational Background

BA, MA, PhD Cognitive Psychology, University of Michigan

Scholarly Interests

Spatial Language and Thinking, Event Perception and Cognition, Diagram Production and Comprehension, Gesture, Diagram, and Language in Communication, Diagrams for Discovery and Design

Selected Publications

Hard, B. M., Recchia, G., and Tversky, B. (2011). The shape of action. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. doi: 10.1037/a0024310

Tversky, B. (2011). Visualizations of thought. Topics in Cognitive Science, 3, 499-535.

Tversky, B. (2011). Spatial thought, social thought. In T. Schubert and A. Maass(Editors), Spatial schemas in social thought. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Tversky, B., Zacks, J. M., Morrison, J. B., and Hard, B. M. (2010). Talking about events. In E. Pederson, J. Bohnemeyer, R. Tomlin (Editors), Event representation in language and cognition. Pp. 216-227. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Tversky, B. and Hard, B. M. (2009). Embodied and disembodied cognition: Spatial perspective taking. Cognition, 110, 124-129.

Tversky, B., Zacks, J. M., and Hard, B. M. (2008). The structure of experience. In T. Shipley and J. M. Zacks (Editors), Understanding events. Pp. 436-464. Oxford: Oxford University.

Kessell, A. M. and Tversky, B. (2008). Cognitive methods for visualizing space, time, and agents. In G. Stapleton, J. Howse, and J. Lee (Editors), Theory and application of diagrams. Dordrecht, NL: Springer.

Tversky, B. (2007). Gestalts of thought. In L. Albertazzi (Editor), Visual thought. Pp. 155-163. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

Heiser, J. and Tversky, B. (2006). Arrows in comprehending and producing mechanical diagrams. Cognitive Science, 30, 581-592.

Tversky, B. (2005). Visuospatial reasoning. In K. Holyoak and R. Morrison (Editors). The Cambridge handbook of thinking and reasoning. Pp. 209-241. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Tversky, B. (2005). Visualizing science. In. J. K. Gilbert (Editor). Visualizations in science education. Boston: Kluwer.

Tversky, B. (2004). Narratives of space, time, and life. Mind and Language, 19, 380-392.

(full publication list see Vitae)

publications

professional experiences

1968-1970     Lecturer, Department of Psychology, Hebrew University
1970-1971     NIMH Postdoctoral Fellowship, Psychology, Stanford University
1971-1972     Postdoctoral Research, Psychology, University of Oregon
1972-1977     Lecturer, Department of Psychology, Hebrew University
1974                Visiting Associate Professor, Psychology, University of Michigan
1977-1978     Visiting Scholar, Psychology, Stanford University
1978-1986     Senior Lecturer, Psychology, Stanford University
1986-1991    Associate Professor, Psychology, Stanford University
1991-2006      Professor, Psychology, Stanford University
2006-               Professor Emerita of Psychology, Stanford University
2005-               Professor of Psychology and Education, Columbia Teachers College

honors and awards

Distinguished Software Award, EDUCOM/NCRIPTAL, 1990
Fellow, American Psychological Society, 1995
Phi Beta Kappa Excellence in Teaching Award, 1999
Fellow, Cognitive Science Society, 2002
Society of Experimental Psychology 2004
Fellow, Russell-Sage Foundation, 2004-2005
Fellow, Eastern Psychological Association 2010

professional organization membership

National and International Committees:

Executive Committee, International Union of Psychological Sciences, 2004-2012
Governing Board: Psychonomic Society, 2001-2007
Governing Board: Cognitive Science Society, 2003-2009
U. S. National Committee of National Academy of Sciences 2001-2012
U. S. Head Delegate to the International Union of Psychological Sciences, 2004
U. S Delegate to the International Union of Psychological Sciences, 2002
Board of Trustees, WonderFest
Board, Federation of Behavioral, Psychological, and Cognitive Sciences, 2001-2007
Member, National Academy of Sciences Committee, “Support for Thinking Spatially.”
Member, National Academy of Sciences Committee, “Visualization of Uncertain Data.”

Editorial Boards:

European Journal of Cognitive Psychology (2001-2005). Associate Editor
Cognitive Processing (1999- )
Spatial Cognition and Computation (1997- )
Cognitive Psychology (1995-2002), Associate Editor
Memory and Cognition (1989-2001)
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General (1982-1988)
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition (1976-1982)
Psychological Research (1976-1984)

HUDK 4029: Human cognition and learning

Cognitive and information-processing approaches to attention, learning, language, memory, and reasoning. Fee: $20.

HUDK 5025: Spatial thinking

Analyzes research on how people learn, mentally represent, mentally transform, describe, and act on the spaces they encounter. Mental models of and transformations of space underlie the way people think about abstract domains, so thought about space has implications for thought in general. Implications for education and HCI are considered.

HUDK 5030: Visual explanations

Surveys production and comprehension of visualizations ranging from ancient cave paintings and petroglyphs to diagrams, charts, graphs, comics, picture books, photographs, gesture, and film to extract and apply techniques for conveying objects, actions, forces relations, and emotions, meanings that are both inherently visible and non-visible. Implications for education, art, media, and HCI are drawn.