Michael Lamb (psychologist)

Michael E. Lamb is a professor and former Head of the then Department of Social and Developmental Psychology at the University of Cambridge. In 2003 Lamb was the recipient of the 2003–2004 James McKeen Cattell Fellow Award from the Association for Psychological Science. Lamb graduated in 1972 with a B.A. degree from the University of Natal. He subsequently obtained a master's degree at Johns Hopkins University followed by a PhD in 1976 from Yale University. He wrote his dissertation on The relationships between infants and their mothers and fathers. Lamb researches early family relationships, child care, developmental science and related public policy. This work has focused on divorce, child custody, child maltreatment, and the effects of child care on children's sociological emotional development. His work in family relationships has focused on the role of fathers and the importance of their relationships with children. This includes traditional and non-traditional families, single fathers, families in economic struggle, and those at risk regarding domestic violence. He has researched how custody arrangements affect paternal relationships with children and the benefit of shared parenting after divorce. Lamb has conducted forensic interviews with children about child abuse and has developed best practices in regards to interviewing children about abuse. He has also researched and written about child care quality. Lamb was the head of the section on social and emotional development of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development in Washington DC for seventeen years. Lamb has published approximately 500 articles, many about child adjustment, has edited 40 books in developmental psychology, reviews about 100 articles a year and serves on editorial boards on several academic journals. He was awarded an honorary doctorate by Abertay University in Dundee in 2015. In 2010 Michael Lamb was to testify in the Perry v. Schwarzenegger trial which challenged the constitutionality of California Proposition 8 against same-sex marriage.