Jennifer S. Lerner, Harvard Kennedy School
Center for Public Leadership
Professor
School of Government
Cambridge, Massachusetts
jennifer_lerner@hks.harvard.edu
Office:
(617) 495-7573
Expert In
Bio/Research
Dr. Jennifer Lerner is Professor of Public Policy and Management at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government as well as the founder of the Harvard Decision Science Laboratory. This inter-disciplinary laboratory draws primarily on psychology, economics, and neuroscience to study human judgment and...
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Bio/Research
Dr. Jennifer Lerner is Professor of Public Policy and Management at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government as well as the founder of the Harvard Decision Science Laboratory. This inter-disciplinary laboratory draws primarily on psychology, economics, and neuroscience to study human judgment and decision-making.
Lerner pursues two primary research interests within the field of Decision Science: (1) emotion and (2) accountability. Her emotion research examines how human feelings influence outcomes involving risk perception, every day economic transactions, and legal judgments. For example, she has discovered that fear and anger have opposing effects on risk estimates, fear increasing and anger decreasing estimates. The insights gained from this work have implications not only for understanding how the brain works but also for understanding how public officials communicate risk, the latter represented in NATOs use of Lerner's work. The second topic, accountability, examines how authority relationships shape judgment and choice outcomes. For example, she and her colleagues have developed a model that predicts when accountability will improve judgment, when it will have no effect on judgment, and when it will make matters only worse. This work has implications for the design of both public and private institutions.
In a new line of research, Professor Lerner has been studying psychological and biological aspects of leadership. In particular, she and her colleagues are examining the respective roles of cortisol and testosterone among elite military and government leaders. Results reveal that these hormonal variables correlate with such outcomes as leadership status, as measured by the number of subordinates each leader has. Important implications for understanding neuroendocrine processes as well as for the design of leadership systems in organizations are emerging from this work.
Professor Lerner publishes her research widely in scientific journals -- summaries of which appear in popular print (e.g., The New York Times) and broadcast media (e.g., Good Morning America). She also serves on the editorial boards for the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, and the Journal of Behavioral Decision Research. She has received several awards for her research, including the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). In a White House ceremony, the National Science Foundation and the President of the United States annually award the PECASE as the highest national honor for investigators in the early stages of promising research careers.
Most recently, Professor Lerner was among the “Sensational 60” honored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) during an event commemorating the 60th anniversary of the Graduate Research Fellowship Program. Out of 45,000 fellowship recipients in the past 60 years, the “Sensational 60” honorees were selected as excellent representatives from each year of the program’s existence.
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Lerner pursues two primary research interests within the field of Decision Science: (1) emotion and (2) accountability. Her emotion research examines how human feelings influence outcomes involving risk perception, every day economic transactions, and legal judgments. For example, she has discovered that fear and anger have opposing effects on risk estimates, fear increasing and anger decreasing estimates. The insights gained from this work have implications not only for understanding how the brain works but also for understanding how public officials communicate risk, the latter represented in NATOs use of Lerner's work. The second topic, accountability, examines how authority relationships shape judgment and choice outcomes. For example, she and her colleagues have developed a model that predicts when accountability will improve judgment, when it will have no effect on judgment, and when it will make matters only worse. This work has implications for the design of both public and private institutions.
In a new line of research, Professor Lerner has been studying psychological and biological aspects of leadership. In particular, she and her colleagues are examining the respective roles of cortisol and testosterone among elite military and government leaders. Results reveal that these hormonal variables correlate with such outcomes as leadership status, as measured by the number of subordinates each leader has. Important implications for understanding neuroendocrine processes as well as for the design of leadership systems in organizations are emerging from this work.
Professor Lerner publishes her research widely in scientific journals -- summaries of which appear in popular print (e.g., The New York Times) and broadcast media (e.g., Good Morning America). She also serves on the editorial boards for the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, and the Journal of Behavioral Decision Research. She has received several awards for her research, including the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). In a White House ceremony, the National Science Foundation and the President of the United States annually award the PECASE as the highest national honor for investigators in the early stages of promising research careers.
Most recently, Professor Lerner was among the “Sensational 60” honored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) during an event commemorating the 60th anniversary of the Graduate Research Fellowship Program. Out of 45,000 fellowship recipients in the past 60 years, the “Sensational 60” honorees were selected as excellent representatives from each year of the program’s existence.
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