The Most Influential People Across History
Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines
Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.
Students and researchers now have a fast and reliable way to find influential thinkers from 24 disciplines and 300 sub-disciplines (and growing). If you want to find history’s most influential philsosophers, or the world’s most influential mathematicians currently, now you can.
We also provide custom rankings of people by discipline as well as interviews with influential academics who are currently active.
To use this tool, select the discipline (and optional subdiscipline) relevant to your research, and specify influential academics by history, world, or US. Even results that are counterintuitive are often enlightening (our algorithm always picks up a signal).
Methodology: How and Why We Rank by Influence …
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List of the most influential people in Psychology,
#2801
Thomas G. Plante
#113403
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (64 years)
Thomas G. Plante is the Augustin Cardinal Bea, S.J. University Professor of psychology on the faculty of Santa Clara University and adjunct clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine. His ideas have been covered in Time Magazine and other news media with regard to sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests, a focus of some of his research and clinical practice. He has also conducted research on exercise psychology, and on the health effects of spiritual and religious practice.
Go to Profile#2802
Jens Batstone Roger Rasmussen
#132163
Overall Influence
#2803
Samuel L. Gaertner
#132194
Overall Influence
#2804
Deniz S. Ones
#132196
Overall Influence
1965 - Present (59 years)
#2805
Karl Rosengren
#113512
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (24 years)
Karl S. Rosengren is an American psychologist, academic, author and researcher. He is a professor with a joint appointment in the brain and cognitive science department and the psychology department at the University of Rochester.
Go to Profile#2806
Lynne Murray
#132272
Overall Influence
#2807
Michael Edward Robinson
#132284
Overall Influence
#2808
Arnaud Delorme
#74484
Overall Influence
1974 - Present (50 years)
Arnaud Delorme is a university professor at Paul Sabatier University in Toulouse, an adjunct faculty member at the Swartz Center for Computational Neuroscience at University of California, San Diego, a consulting research scientist at the Institute of Noetic Sciences. At UCSD, Dr. Delorme contributed to development of the widely used Matlab toolbox for electroencephalography analysis, EEGLAB. He has been acknowledged for his contribution to the field of EEG research by being awarded a Bettencourt-Schueller young investigator award in 2002 and one of three of the ANT EEG Company 10-year Anniversary Young Researcher Awards in 2006.
Go to Profile#2809
Laura H. Goldstein
#96797
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (64 years)
Laura H. Goldstein is Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology at King's College London, and Honorary Consultant Clinical Psychologist at the Lishman Unit, South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust.
Go to Profile#2810
Zoran Bujas
#121401
Overall Influence
1910 - 2004 (94 years)
Zoran Bujas was a Croatian psychologist. Bujas was born in Split and spent his childhood in Zadar and Dubrovnik, where he graduated from high school in 1928. He graduated psychology from the University of Zagreb in 1932, where he obtained his Ph.D. in 1933. Bujas continued his studies at the University of Paris from 1933 to 1936, taking part in research at the Laboratory for the Psychophysiology of Senses, headed by Henri Piéron. From 1938 until his retirement in 1981 he was professor of experimental and physiological psychology at the University of Zagreb.
Go to Profile#2811
Denise C. Park
#129559
Overall Influence
Denise C. Park is an American neuroscientist. She is the head of the Aging Mind Lab, the Principal Investigator of the Dallas Lifespan Brain Study , and a Distinguished University Chair of the School and Behavioral and Brain Sciences at The University of Texas at Dallas.
Go to Profile#2812
Gary Gottfredson
#123390
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (77 years)
Gary Don Gottfredson is an American psychologist and professor emeritus in the Department of Counseling, Higher Education, and Special Education at the University of Maryland–College Park. His research has focused on the psychology of career counseling and assessment, among other topics. He is known for his work with John L. Holland on the development of various assessment tools commonly used by counseling psychologists, such as the Position Classification Inventory.
Go to Profile#2813
Peter Schiller
#99390
Overall Influence
1931 - Present (93 years)
Peter H. Schiller is a professor emeritus of Neuroscience in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology . He is well known for his work on the behavioral, neurophysiological and pharmacological studies of the primate visual and oculomotor systems.
Go to Profile#2814
Lars‐göran Nilsson
#132584
Overall Influence
#2815
Alan Miles Wing
#132611
Overall Influence
#2816
Peter Emanuel Sifneos
#132696
Overall Influence
#2817
Dieter Frey
#132697
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (78 years)
#2818
H. Herman Bouma
#132713
Overall Influence
#2819
Marvin E. Shaw
#132717
Overall Influence
#2820
Alexander von Eye
#131415
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (75 years)
Alexander von Eye is a German-American psychologist and former professor of Methods in Psychology at the University of Vienna in Vienna, Austria. Before joining the University of Vienna in 2012, he taught at Michigan State University, where he served as chair of the Unit of Developmental Psychology from 2003 to 2008. Before joining Michigan State University in 1993, he served as Professor of Human Development and Psychology at Penn State University. He has developed methods for analyzing categorical and longitudinal data in psychology. He is a fellow of the American Psychological Association and the American Psychological Society.
Go to Profile#2821
Hannah Steinberg
#89532
Overall Influence
1926 - 2019 (93 years)
Hannah Steinberg was a pioneer of experimental psychopharmacology, the study of the interaction of drugs on the human mind. Early life Steinberg was born in Vienna to the lawyer Michael Steinberg and his wife Marie . They arranged for her to leave Vienna in 1938 and she was one of the first Jewish children to travel on the Kindertransport. and arrived in London where she was educated at Putney High School and Queen Anne's School, Caversham. After studying for a Certificate in Commerce at Reading University and then at Denton Secretarial College she changed course. After beginning a degree in...
Go to Profile#2822
David W. Sparrow
#132910
Overall Influence
#2823
Zsolt Demetrovics
#132926
Overall Influence
1971 - Present (53 years)
#2824
Lance Rips
#100172
Overall Influence
1948 - Present (76 years)
Lance Jeffrey Rips is an American psychologist and professor in the Department of Psychology at Northwestern University. Before joining Northwestern in 1994, he taught at the University of Chicago for nineteen years. His research has focused on human memory and deductive reasoning, among other topics. He received a Fulbright Fellowship in 2004 and 2005, and he was a Guggenheim Fellow in 2008. In addition, he is a fellow of the Cognitive Science Society, American Psychological Association, the Association for Psychological Science, and the Society of Experimental Psychologists.
Go to Profile#2825
James T. Tedeschi
#132966
Overall Influence
#2826
Pudugramam Murali Doraiswamy
#132978
Overall Influence
#2827
Mark L. Savickas
#132995
Overall Influence
#2828
Barrie Gunter
#133004
Overall Influence
#2829
Kenneth I. Forster
#133141
Overall Influence
#2830
Friedrich Lösel
#94451
Overall Influence
1945 - Present (79 years)
#2831
Edith de Leeuw
#105512
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (62 years)
Edith Desiree de Leeuw is a Dutch psychologist, statistician, research methodologist, and professor in survey methodology and survey quality, at the University of Utrecht. She is known for her work in the field of survey research.
Go to Profile#2832
Howard Mark Chertkow
#133254
Overall Influence
#2833
Don Edgar
#59242
Overall Influence
1936 - Present (88 years)
Dr. Donald E. Edgar is the Foundation Director of the Australian Institute of Family Studies. Under his leadership the Institute had a profound influence on the Government of Australia regarding family policy, family and work, welfare policy and family law. He continues to contribute to Australian thinking in these areas through his own consulting practise and as an occasional columnist and commentator in the Australian media, particularly The Age and The Australian.
Go to Profile#2834
Karl -olov Fagerström
#133328
Overall Influence
#2835
John W. Mason
#133347
Overall Influence
#2836
Peter W. Halligan
#133366
Overall Influence
#2837
Geraldine Downey
#126612
Overall Influence
Geraldine A. Downey is an Irish-American social psychologist. She is the Robert Johnston Niven Professor of Humane Letters in Psychology at Columbia University. Downey is head of The Samuel and Ronnie Heyman Center on Corporate Governance and is a member of the University of the People's arts and sciences advisory board.
Go to Profile#2838
Frances Degen Horowitz
#84519
Overall Influence
1932 - 2021 (89 years)
Frances Degen Horowitz was an American developmental psychologist who served as President of the Graduate Center, City University of New York from 1991 to 2005. She was instrumental in raising the stature of the institution and moving it to its current location in the B. Altman and Company Building on Fifth Avenue of New York City.
Go to Profile#2839
Karina Ackermann
#133524
Overall Influence
#2840
Leslie Swartz
#133563
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (69 years)
#2841
Willem Heiser
#115867
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (75 years)
Willem Jan Heiser is a Dutch social scientist who was Professor of Psychology, Statistical Methods and Data Theory at the Leiden University between 1989 and 2014. Biography Heiser was born on 19 January 1949 in Rotterdam. He received his PhD in 1981 from the Leiden University with a thesis entitled "Unfolding analysis of proximity data" advised by John van de Geer and Jan de Leeuw. In the year 1981-82 he performed Postdoctoral research at Bell Labs in New Jersey.
Go to Profile#2842
Vernon Quinsey
#126647
Overall Influence
1944 - Present (80 years)
Vernon Lewis Quinsey is a Canadian psychologist. He has studied violent crime offenders, sex offenders, sexually violent predators, juvenile delinquency, and ways to predict, assess, and manage individuals with these tendencies. He testified in court that a rapist, Allen Edward Bullock, was "erotically attracted to that kind of behavior".
Go to Profile#2843
Martina Ziefle
#133620
Overall Influence
#2844
Mika Scheinin
#133656
Overall Influence
#2845
Harriet Wadeson
#85214
Overall Influence
1931 - 2016 (85 years)
Harriet Claire Wadeson Ph.D., LCSW, ATR-BC, HLM was a pioneer in the art therapy profession, as well as an accomplished author, researcher, and educator, who established and directed the Art Therapy Graduate Program at the University of Illinois at Chicago and the Art Therapy Certificate Program at Northwestern University where she taught up to her passing. She was the author of 8 books on art therapy and over 70 articles in professional journals. She was an international guest lecturer, and educator who has presented papers, led professional delegations, and conducted workshops in 14 count...
Go to Profile#2846
Rudolf Uher
#131187
Overall Influence
Rudolf Uher is a Canadian psychiatrist and professor in the Department of Psychiatry at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. His research focuses on the causes, prevention, and treatment of severe mental illnesses such as psychosis, major depression, and bipolar disorder. He was a Canada Research Chair in Early Intervention in Psychiatry at Dalhousie University in 2012. He received the Max Hamilton Memorial Prize from the International College of Neuropsychopharmacology in 2014 and the Royal-Mach-Gaensslen Prize for Mental Health Research from the Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre in 2016.
Go to Profile#2847
Richard Leo
#102500
Overall Influence
1963 - Present (61 years)
Richard A. Leo is the Hamill Family Professor of Law and Psychology at the University of San Francisco School of Law, and a Fellow in the Institute for Legal Research at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law. He previously taught at the University of Colorado, Boulder from 1994 to 1997, and at the University of California, Irvine from 1997 to 2006. He is known for his research on police interrogation practices, false confessions, and wrongful convictions. He was elected as a Guggenheim fellow in 2011 and was a fellow of the Center for the Advanced Study in the Behavioral Science...
Go to Profile#2848
Robert E. Emery
#111198
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (72 years)
Robert Edgar Emery is a professor of psychology and director of the Center for Children, Families, and the Law at the University of Virginia. His research focuses on topics related to family relationships, such as divorce and family violence, and their effects on children's mental health. Books that he has authored include Marriage, Divorce, and Children’s Adjustment, Renegotiating Family Relationships: Divorce, Child Custody, and Mediation, The Truth about Children and Divorce: Dealing with the Emotions So You and Your Children Can Thrive, and Two Homes, One Childhood: A Parenting Plan to Last a Lifetime.
Go to Profile#2849
Elaine Reese
#74230
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (74 years)
Jeanne Elaine Reese is an American-New Zealand psychology academic. Academic career After a PhD at Emory University on early-childhood literacy, Reese moved to the University of Otago, where she rose to full professor in 2012. Reese has received four Marsden grants from the Royal Society of New Zealand.
Go to Profile#2850
Stephan D. Fihn
#133789
Overall Influence
