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Nalini Ambady

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Nalini Ambady
Nalini Ambady in 2009
Born(1959-03-20)March 20, 1959
Calcutta, India
DiedOctober 28, 2013(2013-10-28) (aged 54)
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Alma materHarvard University
College of William and Mary
Known forThin-slicing
AwardsAAAS Prize for Behavioral Science Research
Scientific career
FieldsPsychology
InstitutionsCollege of the Holy Cross
Stanford University
Tufts University
Harvard University
Doctoral advisorRobert Rosenthal
Doctoral studentsJon Freeman
Jennifer Richeson
Michael Slepian

Nalini Ambady (March 20, 1959 – October 28, 2013) was an Indian-American social psychologist and a leading expert on nonverbal behavior and interpersonal perception.[1]

Early life and education

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A native of the state of Kerala, India, Ambady did her schooling at the Lawrence School, Lovedale, and joined college at the Lady Shri Ram College for Women, Delhi.[2][3] Subsequently, she moved to the United States for higher education, completing her M.A. in psychology from the College of William & Mary, Virginia. She earned her Ph.D. in social psychology from Harvard University in 1991 under the guidance of Robert Rosenthal, with whom she researched thin slice judgments.[4][5]

Academic career

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She held academic positions at Harvard University[6] and the College of the Holy Cross[7] before being appointed as professor in the Department of Psychology at Tufts University in 2004. She subsequently moved to Stanford University, California in 2011.[8]

Ambady specialized in the study of intuition. Her research found that humans perceive nonverbal cues in response to novel people or situations and that the information gleaned from an instant impression is often as powerful as information gleaned by getting to know a situation or person over a longer period of time.[9] She and Robert Rosenthal coined the term "thin slices" to refer to such instantaneous non-verbal cues. Later, author Malcolm Gladwell referred extensively to Ambady's work in Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking.[citation needed]

One of Ambady's more well-known experiments asked students to watch silent 10-second videos of unfamiliar professors as they taught, and to rate the professors for likability, honesty, competence, and other qualities. The students' responses correlated remarkably well with similar ratings by students who had spent a full semester getting to know the professors' personalities and teaching qualities.[9]

Founding of SPARQ

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During Ambady's appointment at Stanford, she founded SPARQ, the Center for Social Psychological Answers to Real-World Questions. The center was initially called "The Lewin Center", after social psychology pioneer Kurt Lewin. SPARQ officially opened its doors in 2014 after Ambady died, but she was active in its formation whilst ill with leukemia until her death.[10] The main goal of SPARQ is to improve society by taking knowledge from the field of social psychology directly to policymakers, teachers and other impactful societal figures. SPARQ is an attempt to address the gap between psychology and the real world and aims to build a bridge between the hands-on experiences of practitioners in the field, and the scientific findings of the lab. SPARQ attempts to accomplish this goal through the fostering of meaningful collaborations between practitioners and social psychologies to the benefit of both.[11][12]

Illness and death

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Ambady was diagnosed with leukemia in May 2004 but recovered after treatment. In 2011, the cancer recurred in a more aggressive form.[13] Her friends and family led a worldwide campaign to find a compatible bone-marrow donor since there were none in existing bone-marrow registries. This was partly due to the low numbers of Indians on registries worldwide and a limited base of donors numbering around 25,000 in the few Indian registries that exist.[14][15] Her plight sparked a global effort to increase participation in bone marrow registries among South Asian ethnic groups.[16] Though as many as thirteen potential donors were located over a period of time, many of them refused to go through with the transplant process after identification.[13]

Ambady died on October 28, 2013, at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.[9][17]

Awards and honours

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Ambady was a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Psychological Association, and the Association for Psychological Science. She won the AAAS Prize for Behavioral Science Research in 1993.[18] She was presented the Carol and Ed Diener Award in Social Psychology in 1999 by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology for substantial contribution to the field.[12] She also received the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers from President Bill Clinton.[9]

Books

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ Gladwell, Malcolm, 1963- (2005). Blink : the power of thinking without thinking (1st ed.). New York: Little, Brown and Co. ISBN 0316172324. OCLC 55679231.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  2. ^ Warnick, J.E.; Landis, D. (2015). Neuroscience in Intercultural Contexts. International and Cultural Psychology. Springer New York. ISBN 978-1-4939-2260-4. Retrieved 9 Apr 2023.
  3. ^ Rule, Nicholas O. "Foreword: A dedication to Nalini Ambady" (PDF). University of Toronto. Retrieved 9 April 2023.
  4. ^ Ambady, Nalini; Rosenthal, Robert (1992). "Thin slices of expressive behavior as predictors of interpersonal consequences: A meta-analysis". Psychological Bulletin. 111 (2): 256–274. doi:10.1037/0033-2909.111.2.256. ISSN 1939-1455. S2CID 31293145.
  5. ^ Tannenbaum, Melanie. "Rest In Peace, Nalini Ambady". Scientific American. Retrieved 30 October 2013.
  6. ^ "Psychology Professor Denied Tenure | News | The Harvard Crimson". www.thecrimson.com. Retrieved 2023-03-16.
  7. ^ TIMES, Margalit Fox, THE NEW YORK. "Former Holy Cross professor Ambady dies at 54". The Worcester Telegram & Gazette. Retrieved 2023-03-16.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  8. ^ Ambady, Nalini. "Curriculum Vitae" (PDF). Tufts University. Retrieved 30 October 2013.
  9. ^ a b c d Fox, Margalit (4 November 2013). "Nalini Ambady, Psychologist of Intuition, Is Dead at 54". The New York Times. Retrieved 12 November 2013.
  10. ^ Conner, Alana C. (2014-02-28). "Stanford SPARQ Sparks Change". APS Observer. 27 (3).
  11. ^ "Ambady leaves behind legacy of influential research, respect for her students". Stanford Daily. 8 November 2013. Retrieved 14 January 2014.
  12. ^ a b "Nalini Ambady, Stanford psychology professor, dies at 54". Stanford News. 31 October 2013. Archived from the original on 4 December 2013. Retrieved 14 January 2014.
  13. ^ a b D'Souza, Dilip. "Will We Save Nalini Ambady?". Yahoo. Retrieved 30 October 2013.
  14. ^ Efforts on to find bone marrow match for Nalini, Times of India, 2013, retrieved 2013-05-07
  15. ^ Teo, Niuniu (2013), Students organize to find bone marrow match for Prof. Nalini Ambady, Stanford, CA: Stanford University, retrieved 2013-05-07
  16. ^ Gaufberg, Liz (May 2013). "Saving Nalini: Leading Psychologist Seeks Bone Marrow Donor to Survive". WBUR.
  17. ^ "Bone marrow search fails, Stanford professor Nalini Ambady dies in US". Deccan Chronicle. 30 October 2013. Archived from the original on 1 November 2013. Retrieved 30 October 2013.
  18. ^ "History & Archives: AAAS Prize for Behavioral Science Research".
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