Singapore, Monday, 20 June 2011 – The Association for Psychological Science (APS) has conferred the prestigious award of Fellow status in the APS to Professor David Chan ((陈振中), Director of the Behavioural Sciences Institute and Professor of Psychology of the Singapore Management University (SMU) for his sustained outstanding contributions to the advancement of psychological science.
APS, which has approximately 23,000 members worldwide, is the premier non-profit international organisation for scientists and practitioners across all fields of psychology. The mission of APS is to promote, protect and advance the interests of scientifically-oriented psychology in research, application, teaching and the improvement of human welfare. APS also engages public policy makers to increase the understanding of the role of behaviour in health, education, productivity, and other areas of public concern.
The APS Fellow status is an honour bestowed upon prominent scientists who have made unusual and sustained outstanding contributions to the science of psychology. Prominent scientists who have received the APS status award include world-renowned psychologists Professor Robert Sternberg and Professor Ed Diener.
In addition to this award, Professor Chan has received several prestigious international scholarly awards from various scientific organizations. Earlier this year, he was presented the award of Elected Fellow of the Society for Industrial and Organisational Psychology (SIOP) and was the first Asian to receive the prestigious award, and in 2010 he was presented the award of Elected Fellow of the International Association of Applied Psychology.
In 2003, he made history by being the first non-American to receive the prestigious Distinguished Early Career Contributions Award presented by SIOP. He was ranked 9th worldwide in the list of Top 100 most published researchers of the 1990s in the top journals of Industrial and Organizational Psychology. Professor Chan is editor and board member on several scholarly journals. He also serves on a six-member international committee (which include Nobel Laureate in Economics Professor Daniel Kahneman) formed to develop measures of national well-being across countries.
About the Behavioural Sciences Institute (BSI)
The Behavioural Sciences Institute (BSI) is a multi-disciplinary research institute for creating, disseminating and applying scientific knowledge about human behaviours in various social, organisational and cultural settings.
The BSI operates in a collaborative manner by bringing academia, business and government to work together to better understand human behaviours. The purpose is to promote the adoption of evidence-based approaches to develop effective organisational practices and public policies with the view to enhancing performance, adaptability and well-being at the individual, organisational and societal levels.
The Institute has received a S$4.5 million grant from the Civil Service College as a start-up fund to build capabilities and conduct research with public sector agencies. To ensure long term sustainability, SMU will raise additional funds to support the Institute's activities.