Rate My Professor Lawrence Cohn

Lawrence D. Cohn is a Professor in phased retirement in the Department of Psychology at the University of Texas at El Paso, where he joined as Assistant Professor in 1989 and advanced through the ranks to full Professor. His extensive career at UTEP encompasses leadership roles including Interim Chair of the Department of Psychology (2002-2003), Area Head of the Graduate Program in Health Psychology (2004-2007), Director of Graduate Programs in Psychology (2007-2010), and Associate Dean for Research in the College of Liberal Arts (2011-present). Prior to UTEP, Cohn served as a John D. & Catherine T. MacArthur Postdoctoral Fellow in the Graduate Program in Health Psychology at the University of California, San Francisco (1985-1987), Visiting Assistant Professor at Washington University (1987-1989), and Visiting Professor at Leiden University (2001-2002). He also held an adjunct appointment as Professor of Health Promotion and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Texas School of Public Health at Houston (2003-2009). Cohn earned his B.A. in Psychology from Boston University in 1972 and his Ph.D. in Psychology from Washington University in 1984.

Cohn's research focuses on personality development, adolescent risk-taking, and injury prevention, integrating applied and basic approaches. He has directed grants from the National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Institute of Mental Health, and Texas Department of Transportation, funding projects such as seatbelt interventions along the Texas-Mexico border, DWI prevention for El Paso youth, and language analysis for drug use risk. His contributions include the Outstanding Faculty Achievement Award from UTEP's College of Liberal Arts (1999) and nomination for the Chancellor's Council Outstanding Teaching Award (2002). Key publications feature meta-analyses like "Sex differences in the course of personality development: A meta-analysis" (Psychological Bulletin, 1991), "How meta-analysis increases statistical power" (Psychological Methods, 2003), and "Intelligence and Maturity: Meta-analytic Evidence for the Incremental and Discriminant Validity of Loevinger’s Measure of Ego Development" (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2004, with P.M. Westenberg); empirical studies such as "Risk perception: differences between adolescents and adults" (Health Psychology, 1995); and editorship of Personality Development: Theoretical, Empirical, and Clinical Investigations of Loevinger’s Conception of Ego Development (Lawrence Erlbaum, 1998, with P.M. Westenberg and A. Blasi). With over 4,000 citations, his scholarship has influenced risk communication, public health interventions, and developmental psychology.