Andrew Johnson

Andrew Johnson is a Professor of Psychology at Park University, where he has been teaching since 1997. He currently serves as the Director of the PEARL (Psychology Experimental and Research Laboratory) research lab at the university.12

Education and Background

Dr. Johnson received his academic training at the following institutions:

• Bachelor's degrees in Psychology and Spanish from Missouri Western State University
• Master's degree in Experimental Psychology from Kansas State University
• Ph.D. in Experimental Psychology with an emphasis in Cognition from Kansas State University13

He has also earned additional certifications, including a Certificate of Effective College Instruction and a Certificate in Creativity and Innovation.1

Academic Career

At Park University, Dr. Johnson has:

• Taught for over 26 years
• Served as Chair of the Department of Psychology & Sociology for a total of 9 years
• Developed and taught 21 different courses, including 8 online courses
• Held various leadership roles such as Faculty Senate President and Director of the First-year Program2

Research and Expertise

His research interests include:

• Social cognition
• Creativity measurement
• Perceptions of superheroes and villains
• Figurative language processing
• Cognitive maps
• Scholarship of teaching
• Science and pseudoscience13

Dr. Johnson is actively involved in several professional associations, including the Association for Psychological Science, American Psychological Association Division 2 (Society for the Teaching of Psychology), and the Missouri Academy of Science, where he currently serves as Section Chair for Social/Behavioral Sciences.13

Publications and Achievements

Dr. Johnson has published numerous research papers and articles in peer-reviewed journals. Some recent publications include:

• A study on enhancing quality of care for older adults using assistive devices (2024)
• Research on using pixel counts to measure accuracy in mental map representations (2022)
• A paper on crowdsourced versus criterion-based creativity measurements of drawings (2021)1

Throughout his career, Dr. Johnson has also served as a consultant and reviewer for various educational organizations, including the College Board's CLEP Psychology Review Committee and Educational Testing Services for the Advanced Placement Psychology examination.2