The first time Roger E. Kirk, PhD, taught a course on statistics, he fell in love with the subject. He hopes to nurture that same passion in other psychologists with a substantial bequest to the APF to establish a Div. 5 (Quantitative and Qualitative Methods) fund in his name.
"I've spent almost all my life writing statistics books and teaching statistics courses, and I want to promote the field because it is the backbone of psychology research," says Kirk, a distinguished professor of psychology and neuroscience and master teacher at Baylor University in Texas. "It's an exciting field that is constantly evolving, and it gives us the tools we need to discern what is happening in the research we do."
The fund will support a $50,000 award for the Quantitative or Qualitative Author of the Year. The winner's department also will receive $15,000. Additional money will fund APA's Div. 5 workshops, trainings and other activities on quantitative and qualitative methods. Kirk is also eager to direct a portion of the money to graduate students who need financial assistance to attend events hosted by the division.
"I'd like to see more graduate students go into statistics," Kirk says. "It's not a field that typically attracts a lot of students because they are usually drawn to other areas like clinical psychology, but this fascinating discipline allows us to discover new knowledge and develop new ideas."
Before joining the faculty at Baylor University, Kirk earned bachelor's and master's degrees in music at Ohio State University, but he lacked the talent needed to pursue a career in music, he says. Kirk met with a career counselor, and his assessment test results suggested that math or psychology would be a good fit. He chose the latter and enrolled in the experimental psychology PhD program at Ohio State University. His doctoral research centered on psychoacoustics.
After receiving his PhD in 1955, he started working as the senior psychoacoustical engineer at the Baldwin Piano and Organ Company, where he conducted research to improve the sound quality of pianos and organs. In 1958, he accepted a position as an assistant professor of psychology at Baylor, and learned that the department had a tradition of asking new faculty members to teach statistics.
"It was considered an onerous task, but that's when I discovered how much I loved statistics," Kirk says.
He went on to complete a postdoctoral fellowship in mathematical psychology at the University of Michigan. Kirk has written nearly 150 publications about statistics, including five books. He is also a fellow of APA Divs. 1, 2, 5, 13 and 21, and has served as a president and executive council member for Div. 5. His awards include APA's Jacob Cohen Award for Distinguished Contributions to Teaching and Mentoring in 2005.
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