Ronald F. Levant is a psychologist, a professor, and a former president of the American Psychological Association (APA). After earning an undergraduate degree at the University of California, Berkeley, Levant completed a Doctor of Education (EdD) at Harvard University. He also holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from Boston University.[1]
Much of Levant's work has focused on men and fatherhood. At Boston University in the 1980s, Levant taught eight-week parenting courses for fathers.[2] He co-authored the parenting guide Between Father and Child in the 1980s.[3] From 2007 to 2015, he served as the editor of the journal Psychology of Men and Masculinity.[4] He is widely considered one of the key people responsible for creating the new field of the psychology of men and masculinities. He was included in the Elsevier-Stanford University data base listing the top 2% of scientists in the world. His subfields are listed as social psychology (rank # 577) and clinical psychology (rank # 626).[5]
Levant is a psychology professor emeritus at the University of Akron.[1] He has also held faculty appointments at Boston University, Harvard Medical School, Rutgers University and Nova Southeastern University.[4] [6] He was the APA president in 2005.[4] He is also a former president of the Massachusetts Psychological Association,[3] and of two Divisions of APA: 43 (Family Psychology) and 51 (Psychology of Men and Masculinities). He was awarded the APA Award for Distinguished Professional Contributions to Applied Research in 2011.[7] His coauthored book, The Tough Standard: The Hard Truths About Masculinity and Violence (2020, Oxford University Press, with Shana Pryor) won the William James Book Award from Division 1 (General Psychology) of APA in 2021.[8]