Morton Gernsbacher

Morton Ann Gernsbacher is the Vilas Research Professor and Sir Frederic C. Bartlett Professor of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she has served for over 20 years, advancing from assistant professor to full professor. She earned a B.S. in Spanish, English, and Education summa cum laude from the University of North Texas in 1976, an M.S. in Human Development from the University of Texas at Dallas, and a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin in 1983. Gernsbacher's research focuses on the cognitive neuroscience of human communication, attention, language comprehension, and atypical communication and cognition, particularly in autism. She pioneered the structure building framework, which explains how comprehenders construct mental representations during language processing, and has explored the role of suppression as a key mechanism in comprehension skills.

Gernsbacher has authored or edited seminal works including Language Comprehension as Structure Building (Erlbaum, 1990), Handbook of Psycholinguistics (Academic Press, 1994; Elsevier, 2006 and 2011), Handbook of Discourse Processes (Erlbaum, 2002), and Psychology and the Real World: Essays Illustrating Fundamental Contributions to Society (Worth Publishers, 2010 and 2014). She has published over 150 journal articles and chapters, with highly cited papers such as 'Gaze fixation and the neural circuitry of face processing in autism' (Nature Neuroscience, 2005) and 'The mechanism of suppression: a component of general comprehension skill' (Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 1991). Her research has been supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, Department of Defense, and Centers for Disease Control. Among her honors are the Oswald Külpe Prize (2025), Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award from the Society for Text and Discourse, Ernest R. Hilgard Career Award for Contributions to General Psychology (2013), Outstanding Teaching Award from the University of Wisconsin-Madison Department of Psychology, and Distinguished Lecturer Award from the Society for the Teaching of Psychology (2022). Gernsbacher has led major organizations as Past President of the Association for Psychological Science, Society for Text and Discourse, APA Division of Experimental Psychology, and Foundation for the Advancement of Behavioral and Brain Sciences; she also chaired the APA Board of Scientific Affairs and served on the AAAS Governing Board.

Professional Email: MAGernsb@wisc.edu