Terrie E. Moffitt, Ph.D., is Professor of Social Development at King’s College London since 1996, and is now also Nannerl O. Keohane University Professor of Psychology at Duke University.  Her expertise is in the areas of longitudinal methods, developmental theory, clinical mental health research, neuropsychology, and genomics in behavioral science.

She is interested in the consequences of a lifetime of mental and behavioral disorder on processes of aging. She is the associate director of the Dunedin Longitudinal Study, which follows a 1972 birth cohort in New Zealand.  She also founded the Environmental Risk Longitudinal Twin Study (E-Risk), which follows a 1994 birth cohort in the UK. Her research team was among the first cohorts to collect DNA, in 1996.

Her team emphasises representing science accurately to the media, and promotes public understanding of behavioural science. Professor Moffitt is also a licensed clinical psychologist, with specialization in neuropsychological assessment. She has a published record of collaboration with criminologists, economists, geneticists, epidemiologists, sociologists, demographers, gerontologists, statisticians, neuroscientists, medical scientists, even opthalmologists and dentists.

She is a fellow of the British Academy, Academy of Medical Sciences (UK), Academia Europa, Association of Psychological Science, and the American Society of Criminology. Professor Moffitt attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for her undergraduate degree in psychology. She continued her training in psychology at the University of Southern California, receiving an M.A. in experimental animal behavior, and a  Ph.D. in clinical psychology.  She also completed postdoctoral training at University of California, Los Angeles Neuropsychiatric Institute. 

Further details are available at Prof. Moffitt's personal website.

Research interests

• Mental health disorders and ageing

Expertise and public engagement

Professor Moffitt’s work was recognized in 2018 by election to the US National Academy of Medicine. She holds honorary doctorates from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium, and Universitat Basel, Switzerland. For her research, Prof. Moffitt has received both the American Psychological Association's Early Career Contribution Award and Distinguished Career Award.

Professor Moffitt was also awarded a Royal Society-Wolfson Merit Award, the Klaus-Grawe Prize, and was a recipient of the Stockholm Prize in Criminology, NARSAD Ruane Prize, and Klaus J. Jacobs Research Prize. Her service includes as a trustee of the Nuffield Foundation in the UK, member of the National Advisory Council on Aging in the USA, and chair of the Jury for the Klaus J. Jacobs Prize in Switzerland.

Her service includes as a trustee of the Nuffield Foundation in the UK, member of the National Advisory Council on Aging in the USA, and chair of the Jury for the Klaus J. Jacobs Prize in Switzerland.