Rex A. Wright

Curriculum Vitae  

 

University of Kansas – Lawrence, Kansas 

 

NIMH National Research Service Award Fellow– Health Psychology/Psychophysiology

The Graduate Center, City University of New York

State University of New York at Stony Brook

 

I am an emeritus professor in the UNT Department of Psychology, affiliated with the Behavioral Science PhD training program. I also am a faculty member in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences in the University of Texas Dell School of Medicine, with courtesy affiliate faculty appointments in the Department of Business, Government and Society at the University of Texas at Austin’s McCombs School of Business and in the Educational Psychology Department in the University of Texas at Austin’s College of Education. I earned my doctorate in social psychology at the University of Kansas, specializing in social motivation, and my bachelor’s in psychology from the University of Texas at Austin. I received two years of postdoctoral training in health psychology and psychophysiology–training first at the Graduate Center, City University of New York, and then at the State University of New York at Stony Brook.

 

Prior to arriving at UNT, I was a faculty member at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, aligned with the medical psychology PhD. training program. I have held visiting faculty appointments at the University of Texas in Austin, the University of Maryland at College Park and the University of Missouri at Columbia and have been a visiting scholar at various European institutions, including the Max Planck Institut für Psychologische Forschung – Munich (Germany), Universität Bielefeld (Germany), Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (Germany), Universitè de Genève (Switzerland) and Jagiellonian University (Poland).

 

My research is motivational, with affective and physiological elements being part and parcel of processes investigated. It is guided by a conceptual analysis that has wide-ranging implications, including ones for chronotype, cognitive decline, cardiovascular health, self-regulation, trauma, and behavior in education, family and work settings. Very recent focuses have been on fatigue and trauma influences on impulse control. I was a founding member of the Society for the Science of Motivation, am a past president of the society, and am Co-Editor-in-Chief of the society’s flagship journal, Motivation Science.

 

American Psychological Association Annual Division 19 Student Research Grant, Ruth King, PI; Role: Co-Sponsor with Dr. A. Boals