Barbara Hanna Wasik, Ph.D.
Barbara Hanna Wasik, Ph.D., William R. Kenan Distinguished Professor Emerita, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is a clinical/school psychologist who has devoted her career to the study of children with social/emotional difficulties as well as language and literacy difficulties, and their families. A Ph.D. graduate of Florida State University in psychology, she completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Duke University then joined the faculty at the University of North Carolina where she held a professorship in the School of Education as well as a research position with the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute (FPG). She taught masters and doctoral students in the School Psychology Program and held administrative positions in the UNC Graduate School, the School of Education, and FPG. She was one of the directors of Project CARE, a randomized study of child care and home visiting and served as an investigator on the longitudinal outcomes of both Project CARE and the Abecedarian Project. She was co-director for curriculum in the national study for low birth weight infants, the Infant Health and Development Program. Bringing together her interests in children and families, she is the developer of a comprehensive preschool and home intervention for preschool children and their families.
She served as President of the North Carolina Psychological Association, a member of the APA Council of Representatives, Chair of the APA Board of Educational Affairs and Chair of the APA Committee on Early Childhood Education. She was one of the three co-chairs of the National Forum on Home Visiting and has served on numerous national boards. She was an invited participant to the White House Conference on Child Care and served as a member of the Committee on Early Childhood Pedagogy of the National Academy of Sciences that produced the study Eager to Learn – Educating Our Preschoolers. Her professional interests include the observational study of children, social and emotional behaviors, problem solving, parenting, language and literacy, and home visiting. The author of over 100 publications and five books, she continues her professional involvement as a fellow of the FPG Institute.