Singapore, 28 August 2017 (Monday) – Both the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) and the American Psychological Association Division of Personality and Social Psychology (APA Division 8) have conferred the prestigious award of Fellow status to Professor David Chan (陈振中教授), Director of the Behavioural Sciences Institute (行为科学研究院院长) and Professor of Psychology of the Singapore Management University (SMU) (新加坡管理大学) for his outstanding contributions in the fields of personality and social psychology.

The SPSP, which currently has more than 7,500 members, is the largest organisation of personality and social psychologists worldwide. Its mission is to advance the science, teaching and application of personality and social psychology to understand individuals in their social contexts for the benefit of all people.

The Fellow status is an honour bestowed upon individuals who have shown evidence of unusual and outstanding contributions and impact in the field of personality and social psychology. Examples of prominent scientists who have received this Fellow status award include world-renowned behavioural scientists and psychologists Professors John Cacioppo, Robert Cialdini, Ed Diener, Nicholas Epley and Philip Zimbardo. 

Professor Chan is internationally known for his scientific contributions in the measurement of personality and social attitudes, as well as in many fields beyond personality and social psychology, including research methods and organisational psychology, particularly in his research on longitudinal modeling and how individuals make judgments and adapt to various changes across diverse situations.

In addition to these two latest Fellow awards, Professor Chan has previously received numerous prestigious international scholarly awards from various scientific organisations. In April 2011, he was the first Asian to be appointed Elected Fellow of the Society for Industrial and Organisational Psychology (SIOP). In the same year, he was named Elected Fellow of both the Association for Psychological Science (APS) and the American Psychological Association (APA), and a year earlier in 2010 he was presented the award of Elected Fellow of the International Association of Applied Psychology (IAAP). Professor Chan is now the first scientist to receive Elected Fellow status from all these six major international organisations for psychologists (i.e., SPSP, APA Division 8, IAAP, SIOP, APS, APA).

This is not the first time that Professor Chan made history. In 2003, he became 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 and he serves on various scientific advisory panels, national councils and boards in the public and people sectors. He is also a regular contributor to various media outlets in Singapore.

Professor Chan’s biographical profile and full CV are attached, for reference.

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Miss Corinne Kang

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Email:  corinnekang [at] smu.edu.sg