Michael J. Beran is Professor of Psychology and Co-Director of the Language Research Center at Georgia State University. He received his B.A. in Psychology from Oglethorpe University in 1995, his M.A. in 1997, and his Ph.D. in 2002, both from Georgia State University. His research is conducted with human and nonhuman primates, including chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas, orangutans, capuchin monkeys, and rhesus monkeys. He also has done research with bears, elephants, and robins. His research interests include perception, numerical cognition, metacognition, planning and prospective memory, self-control, decision making, and language acquisition.
Dr. Beran is a Fellow of Division 3 and Division 6 of the American Psychological Association and a Fellow of the Psychonomics Society. He was the inaugural Duane M. Rumbaugh Fellow at Georgia State University. He received the Brenda A. Milner award from the APA in 2005. He has served as the President of the Southern Society for Philosophy and Psychology, the Southeast Psychological Association, and the Society for Behavioral Neuroscience and Comparative Psychology (Division 6 of APA). He is the current Editor of Animal Behavior and Cognition and has served on numerous editorial boards including Cognition, Animal Cognition, Frontiers in Comparative Psychology, the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Learning and Cognition, Comparative Cognition & Behavior Reviews, the Journal of Comparative Psychology, Learning and Behavior, and the International Journal of Comparative Psychology. He has published over 200 peer-reviewed journal articles and contributed chapters to over 50 edited books and encyclopedia. He also is the co-editor of Foundations of Metacognition (2012, Oxford University Press), the author of Self-control in Animals and People (2018, Elsevier), and the co-editor of the forthcoming Primate Cognitive Studies (2022, Cambridge University Press).
Mike gets 2 pics because I love this slide |
His research has been featured on numerous television and radio programs and in magazines, including Animal Planet, BBC, New Scientist, the Wall Street Journal, and Scientific American Mind. His research is supported by funding from the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, the Templeton Foundation, and the European Science Foundation.
In addition to the fun things he gets to do in his lab and with his students and colleagues, he enjoys beekeeping, hiking, paintball with friends (and enemies!), travel, and the occasional good bourbon. And, of course, ‘Bama football. Roll Tide.