Berkeley News announced last week that Canadian Studies affiliate Alison Gopnik, a research psychologist specializing in child development, has won the 2021 Carl Sagan Prize for Science Popularization. The prize recognizes researchers who have made a significant contribution to the public's understanding of science.
Professor Gopnik is the author of several popular books, including The Scientist in the Crib and The Philosophical Baby. Her research explores how young children come to know about the world around them, using the framework that children are constantly testing theories about the world in much the way that scientists do.
Professor Gopnik was born in Philadelphia and raised in Montreal. She obtained her bachelor's degree from McGill University, and her Ph.D. at Oxford. She taught at the University of Toronto before joining the Berkeley faculty in 1988.