Wikipedia

Celeste Kidd

Celeste Kidd is a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. She was amongst the "Silence Breakers" who were named Time Person of the Year in 2017.

Celeste Kidd
Alma materUniversity of Rochester
University of Southern California
Scientific career
InstitutionsUniversity of California, Berkeley
MIT
Stanford University
ThesisRational Approaches to Learning and Development
Doctoral advisorRichard N. Aslin
Websitewww.kiddlab.com

Early life and education

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Kidd studied print journalism and linguistics at the University of Southern California, where she earned a dual honors degree in 2007.[1] Kidd moved to the University of Rochester for her graduate studies, where she worked in brain and cognitive studies and earned her PhD in 2013. She worked with Richard N. Aslin, an expert on infant learning.[2] Kidd held visiting positions at Stanford University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.[3]

Research and career

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Kidd works on curiosity and exploration throughout early development. She was hired as assistant professor at the University of Rochester in 2012.[2] She has studied the willpower of children, challenging the Stanford marshmallow experiment.[4][5] She demonstrated that children's willpower is influenced by their superior's reliability and trust.[6][7]

Kidd was made director of the Rochester Baby Lab at the University of Rochester in 2014.[3][8] She moved to the University of California, Berkeley, in June 2018.[8] She has studied why it is so difficult to shake a false belief, such as believing in flat earth or climate change denial.[9] Kidd is interested in the neuroscience of curiosity.[10][11] She demonstrated that uncertainty can lead to the most curiosity.[11]

#MeToo advocacy

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In 2016, Kidd alleged sexual harassment by T. Florian Jaeger, a tenured professor at the University of Rochester. The university closed the investigation before speaking to witnesses Kidd named who could corroborate her claims.[12][13] Kidd then became one of eight then current and former faculty members at the University of Rochester to file a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that included statements and evidence from 11 women who experienced the tenured professor's sexual harassment at the University of Rochester.[14][15]

In response, the university paid $4.5 million for an outside investigation led by Mary Jo White which confirmed all substantial allegations about the tenured professor, but suggested that the allegations did not meet the threshold for illegal sexual harassment or retaliation, and that the complainants' narrative was "largely without factual basis."[16][17][18][19][20][21]

Kidd and several other complainants subsequently filed a lawsuit against the university, alleging that it had illegally retaliated against them. In 2020, a federal court disagreed with the conclusions of the Mary Jo White Report and upheld 16 of the 17 claims alleged by the plaintiffs.[22] The university then settled with Kidd and the other plaintiffs for $9.4 million and issued a statement thanking the plaintiffs for bringing their concerns forward.[22][23] As part of the settlement, the university was required to remove the exonerating White report from its public webpage.[21]

Kidd left the University of Rochester in 2018.[24] She has since become a campaigner to end sexual harassment in academia.[25][26][27] Kidd was made a leader in the Me Too movement in academia, and one of several advocates selected as Time Person of the Year.[28] She has criticized how universities are expected to "investigate themselves" when it comes to complaints about sexual harassment.[25] She believes that public pressure and increased transparency will help to transform academia.[25]

Awards and honors

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Kidd has been selected as one of the Association for Psychological Science's Rising Stars.[30]

References

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  1. ^ "Meet our new faculty: Celeste Kidd, psychology". Berkeley News. September 25, 2018. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  2. ^ a b Pauly, Madison. "She was a rising star at a major university. Then a lecherous professor made her life hell". Mother Jones. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  3. ^ a b "Directors". Rochester BabyLab. Archived from the original on January 15, 2015. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  4. ^ a b Ross, Valerie (17 January 2013). "Why Kids Make Rash Decisions". Discover. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  5. ^ Raeburn, Paul; Zollman, Kevin (April 5, 2016). The Game Theorist's Guide to Parenting: How the Science of Strategic Thinking Can Help You Deal with the Toughest Negotiators You Know--Your Kids. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 9780374714406.
  6. ^ Lewis, Jordan Gaines. "Kids' Willpower Influenced By Others' Reliability". Psychology Today. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  7. ^ "New 'marshmallow test' suggests trust matters". CBS News. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  8. ^ a b Valdes, Amanda (June 9, 2018). "Rochester Baby Lab shutting down, moving from U of R". WHAM-TV. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  9. ^ Pappas, Stephanie (September 12, 2018). "Why False Beliefs Are Hard to Shake". Live Science. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  10. ^ Kidd, Celeste; Hayden, Benjamin Y. (November 4, 2015). "The Psychology and Neuroscience of Curiosity". Neuron. 88 (3): 449–460. doi:10.1016/j.neuron.2015.09.010. PMC 4635443. PMID 26539887.
  11. ^ a b "What we think we know, but might not, pushes us to learn more". Neuroscience News. May 23, 2019. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  12. ^ Issen, Laurel (2017-11-02). "University systems allow sexual harassers to thrive". Nature. 551 (7678): 7. Bibcode:2017Natur.551....7I. doi:10.1038/551007a. ISSN 1476-4687. PMID 29094715. S2CID 4456518.
  13. ^ North, Anna (2017-12-14). "This grad student says her professor harassed her. Her life changed. Did his?". Vox. Retrieved 2023-01-20.
  14. ^ "Inside the Process That Jump-Starts Federal Sex-Harassment Lawsuits". The Chronicle of Higher Education. 2018-02-14. Retrieved 2023-01-20.
  15. ^ Carter, Justin (2017-09-21). "UR assistant professor breaks silence on EEOC complaint". WHAM. Retrieved 2023-01-20.
  16. ^ Wadman, Meredith (January 11, 2018). "University of Rochester president resigns as outside attorney issues report on sexual harassment case". Science.
  17. ^ Flaherty, Colleen (January 12, 2018). "No Closure at Rochester". Inside Higher Ed.
  18. ^ Schulte, Max Schulte, Will Cleveland, Ryan Miller and Max. "Florian Jaeger accusers: 'We have audio recordings'". Democrat and Chronicle. Retrieved 2023-01-20.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  19. ^ Flasch, Jane (2018-02-05). "New report: U of R paid $4.5 million for". WHAM. Retrieved 2023-01-20.
  20. ^ Murphy, Justin. "UR complainants issue response to 'rickety' Mary Jo White report". Democrat and Chronicle. Retrieved 2023-01-20.
  21. ^ a b Herzog, Katie (March 14, 2022). "How an Academic Grudge Turned Into a #MeToo Panic". Reason.
  22. ^ a b Wadman, Meredith (March 27, 2020), "University of Rochester and plaintiffs settle sexual harassment lawsuit for $9.4 million", Science
  23. ^ Flaherty, Colleen (March 30, 2020). "Rochester Settles Sex Harassment Case for $9.4M". Inside Higher Ed.
  24. ^ Murphy, Victoria E. Freile and Justin. "Celeste Kidd leaves UR in Jaeger aftermath". Democrat and Chronicle. Retrieved 2023-01-20.
  25. ^ a b c Short, Eva (May 31, 2019). "How do we stamp out sexual harassment in academia?". Silicon Republic. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  26. ^ Prof Celeste Kidd speaks on How Sexual Harassment Creates Inequality in Academia, Trinity College Dublin, April 12, 2019, retrieved July 10, 2019 – via YouTube
  27. ^ "'The Silence Breakers' - in honor of Women's History Month and International Women's Day, the Women's and Gender Studies Program presents Celeste Kidd and Lindsay Wrobel from the U of R". Rochester Institute of Technology. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  28. ^ a b "What Still Needs to Be Done to Break the Silence Surrounding Sexual Harassment". Time. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  29. ^ "Glushko Dissertation Prize". Cognitive Science Society. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
  30. ^ "APS Rising Stars". Association for Psychological Science. Archived from the original on September 5, 2019. Retrieved July 10, 2019.
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