Department of Psychology, Tufts University

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Raymond S. Nickerson
Research Professor
Ph.D., Tufts University, 1965
r.nickerson@tufts.edu

Dr. Nickerson is a former senior vice president of Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc, from which he is retired. His Ph.D., in experimental psychology, is from Tufts University. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Psychological Association, the Association for Psychological Science, the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society and the Society of Experimental Psychologists. A past chair of the National Research Council’s Committee on Human Factors, and a recipient of the Franklin V. Taylor Award from the American Psychological Association, he was the founding editor of The Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied and of Reviews of Human Factors and Ergonomics, an annual publication of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society.

Dr. Nickerson’s research interests include cognition, human factors and applied experimental psychology. His recent work at Tufts has focused primarily on probabilistic reasoning.

Representative Publications

Books:

Nickerson, R. S., Perkins, D. N., & Smith, E. E. (1985). The teaching of thinking. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum .

Nickerson , R. S. (1986). Using computers: Human factors in information systems. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Nickerson , R. S. (1986). Reflections on reasoning. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum .

Nickerson , R. S. (1992). Looking ahead: Human factors challenges in a changing world. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum .

Nickerson , R. S. (2003). Psychology and environmental change. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum .

Nickerson, R. S. (2004). Cognition and chance: The psychology of probabilistic reasoning. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum .

Edited books:

Nickerson, R. S. (Ed.). (1980). Attention and performance VIII. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum .

Nickerson, R. S. & Zodhiates, P. P. (Eds.). (1988). Technology in education: Looking toward 2020. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum .

Nickerson, R. S. (Ed.). (1995). Emerging needs and opportunities for human factors research. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.

Durso, F. (Ed.), Nickerson, R. S., Schvaneveldt, R. W., Dumais, S. T., Lindsay, D. S., & Chi, M. T. H. (Assoc. Eds.). (1999). The handbook of applied cognition. New York: Wiley.

Nickerson, R. S. (Ed.) (2006). Reviews of Human Factors and Ergonomics (Vol. 1). Santa Monica, CA: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society.

Durso, F. (Sr. Ed.), Nickerson, R. S., Dumais, S. T., Lewandowsky, S., & Perfect, T. (Assoc. Eds.). (In press). The handbook of applied cognition (Second edition). New York: Wiley.

Recent articles, chapters, encyclopedia entries:

Nickerson, R. S. (1996). Hempel's paradox and Wason's selection task: Logical and psychological puzzles of confirmation. Thinking and Reasoning, 2, 1-31.

Nickerson, R. S. (1996). Ambiguities and unstated assumptions in probabilistic reasoning. Psychological Bulletin, 120, 410-433.

Nickerson, R. S., & Landauer, T. (1997). Human-computer interaction: Background and issues. In M. Helander, T. Landauer, & P. Prabhu (Eds.), The handbook of human-computer interaction (pp. 3-31). Amsterdam: Elsevier Science.

Nickerson, R. S. (1997). Designing for human use: Human-factors psychologists. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Career paths in psychology (pp. 213-243). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Nickerson, R. S. (1998). Applied experimental psychology. Applied Psychology: An International Review, 47, 155-173.

Nickerson, R. S. (1998). Confirmation bias: A ubiquitous phenomenon in many guises. Review of General Psychology, 2, 175-220.

Nickerson, R. S. (1999). How we know—and sometimes misjudge—what others know: Imputing one’s own knowledge to others. Psychological Bulletin, 125, 737-759.

Nickerson, R. S. (1999). Engineering psychology and ergonomics. In P. Hancock (Ed.), Human performance and ergonomics, Volume 17 of E. C. Carterette & M. Friedman (Eds.), Handbook of perception and cognition (pp. 1-45). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.

Nickerson, R. S. (1999). Enhancing creativity. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of creativity (pp. 392-430). New York: Cambridge University Press.

Nickerson, R. S. (1999). The natural environment: Dealing with the threat of detrimental change. In F. Durso (Ed.) The handbook of applied cognition (pp. 757-788). New York: Wiley.

Nickerson, R. S. (1999). Theory and application in the cognitive regulation of performance: Discussion of Attention and Performance XVII. In D. Gopher & A. Koriat (Eds.), Attention and performance XVII: Cognitive regulation of performance: Interaction of Theory and Application (pp. 747-785). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Nickerson, R. S. (2000). Null hypothesis statistical testing: A review of an old and continuing controversy, Psychological Methods, 5, 241-301.

Nickerson, R. S. (2000). Teaching intelligence. In A. E. Kazdin (Ed.), Encyclopedia of psychology (Vol. 2, pp. 498-501). New York: Oxford University Press

Nickerson, R. S. (2000). Human behavior and the natural environment. In A. E. Kazdin (Ed.), Encyclopedia of psychology (Vol 4, pp. 170-172). New York: Oxford University Press.

Nickerson, R. S. (2000). Technology and communication. In A. E. Kazdin (Ed.), Encyclopedia of psychology (Vol. 8, pp. 28-30). New York: Oxford University Press.

Nickerson, R. S. (2001). Preparing for a career in psychology outside the university. In S. Walfish & A. Hess (Eds.), Succeeding in graduate school: The career guide for psychology students (pp. 289-302) Erlbaum.

Nickerson, R. S. (2001). The projective way of knowing: A useful heuristic that sometimes misleads. Current Directions in Psychological Research, 10, 168-172.

Nickerson, R. S. (2002). The production and perception of randomness. Psychological Review, 109, 330-357.

Nickerson, R. S. (2002). Experimental methods in cognitive science. Encyclopedia of cognitive science (Article 532). London: Macmillan Reference Ltd.

Nickerson, R. S. & Pew, R. W. (2003). Psychological experimentation addressing practical concerns. In A. F. Healy & R. W. Proctor (Eds.), Experimental psychology, Volume 4 in I. B. Weiner (Editor-in-chief), Handbook of psychology (pp. 649-675). New York: Wiley.

Nickerson, R. S. (2004). Teaching reasoning. In J. P. Leighton & R. J. Sternberg (Eds.), The nature of reasoning (pp. 410-442). New York: Cambridge University Press.

Nickerson, R. S. (2005). Bertrand’s chord, Buffon’s needle, and the concept of randomness. Thinking and Reasoning, 11, 67-96.

Nickerson, R. S. (2005). What authors want from journal reviewers and editors. American Psychologist, 60, 661-662.

Nickerson, R. S. (2005). On quantifying and characterizing human knowledge. In A. F. Healy (Ed.). Experimental cognitive psychology and its applications (pp. 197-210). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Nickerson, R. S. (2005). Critical region. In B. S. Everitt & D. C. Howell (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Statistics in Behavioral Science (Vol. 1, pp. 440-441). West Sussex, UK: Wiley.

Nickerson, R. S. (2005). Neyman-Pearson inference. In B. S. Everitt & D. C. Howell (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Statistics in Behavioral Science (Vol. 3, pp. 1402-1408). West Sussex, UK: Wiley.

Nickerson, R. S. (2005). Technology and cognitive amplification. In R. J. Sternberg & D. D. Preiss (Eds.), Intelligence and technology: The impact of tools on the nature and development of human abilities (pp. 3-28). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Nickerson, R. S. & Falk, R. (2006). The exchange paradox: Probabilistic and cognitive analysis of a psychological conundrum. Thinking and Reasoning, 12, 181-213.