Adrian Furnham facts for kids

Adrian Frank Furnham (born on February 3, 1953) is a well-known British psychologist who was born in South Africa. He is an expert in how people behave and think, especially in workplaces. He is also a health psychologist, which means he studies how our minds affect our health.

Adrian Furnham is currently a professor at University College London and also teaches at the BI Norwegian Business School. Throughout his career, he has taught at many universities around the world, including Oxford.

He has studied many different areas of psychology, like how people act in groups, how they make economic decisions, and how their personalities affect their lives. He has written a huge number of books and articles – over 92 books and more than 1,200 articles! He is a respected member of the British Psychological Society and has received awards for his work.

Early Life

Adrian Furnham was born on February 3, 1953, in Port Shepstone, South Africa. His parents were British. He grew up as an only child. His father worked with newspapers, and his mother was a nurse.

Education

Adrian Furnham started university when he was just sixteen years old, in 1970. He studied history, psychology, and theology. He earned his first degree in 1972 and continued his studies, getting a Master of Arts degree in 1974. His master's research looked at how people from different cultures follow group norms.

He then went on to earn another master's degree in economics from the University of London in 1975. Later, he completed a Master of Science degree at the University of Strathclyde. In 1981, he earned his doctorate from Oxford University. He continued his learning, receiving more advanced degrees in 1991 and 1997.

Career

Adrian Furnham is a professor of psychology at University College London. Before this, he taught at many places, including Pembroke College, Oxford, and universities in Australia and the Caribbean. He also taught business management in Hong Kong and at the Henley Management College. Since 2009, he has also been a professor of management at the Norwegian School of Management.

He is known as a Chartered Occupational Psychologist. This means he is an expert in helping people and companies work better together. He is a Fellow of the British Psychological Society, which is a high honor for psychologists. He was even recognized as one of the most productive psychologists in 1995.

Adrian Furnham is also the president of the International Society for the Study of Individual Differences. He started a company called Applied Behavioral Research Associates (ABRA), which helps businesses with things like teamwork, managing performance, and developing leaders. He has worked with many international companies. Because of his important work, he received several awards, including the British Psychological Society Academic Contribution to Practice Award in 2011.

He has written over 92 books, and many of them have been translated into different languages like Chinese, French, German, and Spanish. Besides books, he has written articles for major newspapers like the Financial Times and Guardian, and magazines such as New Scientist. He also appears regularly on TV and radio channels like BBC and CNN, sharing his knowledge.

Research

Adrian Furnham's research explores many interesting topics in psychology.

What He Studies

Personality Tests and Reviews

Adrian Furnham has looked closely at different personality tests. He compares how various tests measure the same things and reviews both old and new ways of understanding personality. For example, he has reviewed tests that measure how much people can handle uncertainty or how much they believe in fairness.

Developing New Tests

He has also created his own tests. He adapted existing ideas to make specific tools, like a test in 1986 to measure how people feel about economic control. In 2006, with his student Dino Petrides, he developed the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire. This test helps measure a person's emotional intelligence. He also created the High Flyer Trait Inventory in 2014, which looks at personality traits important for how people act at work.

Self-Awareness and Intelligence

Adrian Furnham has always been very interested in how people see themselves and how they estimate their own intelligence. His studies have shown that, on average, males tend to guess their general intelligence is higher than females do. These differences have been seen across different generations and cultures.

The "Dark Side" of Personality

He has also studied what is called the "dark side" of personality. This refers to certain behaviors and beliefs that can be difficult or even harmful to others. For example, people who are very self-centered or don't care about how their actions affect others might fall into this category. While these behaviors can seem negative, they sometimes help people get ahead in their careers. Furnham has written several papers and two books on this topic, helping us understand misbehavior at work.

Awards and Achievements

• 2010 Elected Fellow of the Leadership Trust
• 2010 Elected Academician of the Learned Society of the Social Sciences
• 2011 British Psychological Society Academic Contribution to Practice Award
• 2017 Lifetime Achievement Award