Emeritus Professor Donald Bersoff has been selected to receive the 2016 Raymond D. Fowler Award for Outstanding Contributions to the American Psychological Association.
The award is the most prestigious honor given by the APA, the largest scientific and professional organization representing psychology in the U.S., representing more than 122,500 researchers, educators, clinicians, consultants and student members.
Bersoff, the founding director of the Law School’s Law and Psychology Program, served as president of the APA in 2013. Earlier in his career, Bersoff served as general counsel to the organization and as a partner at the Washington, D.C. firms Jenner & Block and Ennis Friedman & Bersoff.
A nationally recognized leader in mental health law, Bersoff has published dozens of books, chapters and articles on legal and ethical issues in mental health, developmental disabilities and education.
He edited the landmark “Ethical Conflicts in Psychology,” which is in its 4th edition and has been translated into Chinese.
Bersoff developed the nation’s second joint law and psychology program, offered by Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland School of Law. Before coming to Drexel, he directed the JD-PhD program in Law and Psychology jointly offered by Villanova University School of Law and the Department of Clinical & Health Psychology at MCP Hahnemann University (which has since merged with Drexel University).