CAMPBELL LEAPER
Professor of Psychology 
University of California, Santa Cruz 
 

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

 
Undergraduate Education and Research
Campbell Leaper received a B.A. Magna Cum Laude with honors distinction in Psychology from Boston University. He was also awarded Phi Beta Kappa. Leaper's primary mentors at B.U. were Jean Berko Gleason and George Michel. 
After finishing his B.A., Leaper worked as a research assistant at the Boston V.A. Hospital's Aphasia Research Center with Harold Goodglass, Margaret Naeser, and Martin Albert. He also worked as a research assistant at the Education Development Center. 

 
Graduate Education and Research
Leaper did his graduate studies at U.C.L.A. where he received M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in Psychology. During his graduate training at U.C.L.A., he specialized in Developmental Psychology with minors in Social Psychology and Language Disorders. His graduate mentors included Patricia Greenfield, Nancy Henley, Nancy Rader, Rosslyn Gaines, and Christiane Baltaxe. 
Leaper's early graduate research focused on the pragmatic aspects of children's language development and language disorders. He collaborated with Patricia Greenfield on a study into the functions of young children's language use (Greenfield, Reilly, Leaper, & Baker, 1985). This was followed by a stint as a Research Associate at the U.C.L.A. Neuropsychiatric Institute. Leaper managed a project for Rosslyn Gaines investigating communication training in nonverbal children (Gaines, Leaper, Monahan, & Weickgenant, 1988). During this time, Leaper also completed a training in language disorders with Christiane Baltaxe at the Neuropsychiatric Institute. His work included a study of thought-disordered schizophrenic children's discourse (Leaper & Emmorey, 1985). 

 
Leaper's broader interest in the pragmatic/social functions of language and communication led to a shift in his research focus. In particular, Leaper began to consider how language is used to create, maintain, and transform gendered relationships. Nancy Henley became an important advisor and mentor during this period. 

 

While a graduate student, Leaper carried out three published studies examining links between language and gender. The first study investigated the relationship between gender, gender self-concept, and college students' communication style (Leaper, 1987). The second study considered how the use of gendered adjectives ("feminine" and "masculine") to describe human behaviors contribute to the perpetuation of gender stereotypes (Leaper, 1995). Finally, Leaper's dissertation research looked at gender- and age-related variations in children's communication (Leaper, 1986, 1991). 
Postdoctoral Research Fellowship
After completing his doctorate, Leaper was a Research Fellow in Psychology at Harvard Medical School for two years. He collaborated with Stuart Hauser on a longitudinal project of adolescent psychosocial development (Leaper, Hauser et al., 1989). Also, at this time, Leaper approached his former undergraduate mentor, Jean Berko Gleason, for access to her tapes and transcripts of parent-child play. He analyzed how variations in the play setting influenced gender-related variations in parent and child communication (Leaper & Gleason, 1996).
UCSC Psychology Faculty
Professor Leaper joined the Psychology faculty at UCSC in 1988. He was Associate Dean of Social Sciences and Founding Provost of College Nine and College Ten (2000-2006). Over the years, Professor Leaper has collaborated with several UCSC undergraduate and gradate students in his research on the socialization and the social construction of gender and sexism.  
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