Patricia H. Miller

Patricia Hackney Miller (born 1945) is an American developmental psychologist known for her research on cognitive development during early childhood. She holds the position of Professor of Psychology at San Francisco State University.

Miller is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association (APA), Division 1 (General) and Division 7 (Developmental Psychology) and a Fellow the Association for Psychological Science. She served as President of APA Division 7 from 2008-2010.

Biography Miller was raised in rural Kansas and, as a child, attended a one-room school. Her interest in psychology began as an undergraduate at the University of Kansas taking Introductory Psychology in her first semester. At first she aspired to be a clinical psychologist but turned to experimental psychology under the mentorship of Frances Degen Horowitz. As a graduate student, Miller worked as a research assistant with Eleanor Gibson and conducted experiments on rabbits and kittens on the visual cliff.

Miller joined the faculty of the University of Georgia in 2001 where she was also Director of the Institute of Women's Studies (2001–2005). She also co-authored the textbook Cognitive Development (with John Flavell and Scott Miller) and co-edited Toward a Feminist Developmental Psychology (with Ellin Kofsky Scholnick) and Conceptual Development: Piaget's Legacy (with Scholnick, Katherine Nelson, and Susan Gelman).

Representative work Best, J. R., Miller, P. H., & Jones, L. L. (2009). Executive functions after age 5: Changes and correlates. Developmental Review, 29(3), 180-200. Best, J. R., & Miller, P. H. (2010). A developmental perspective on executive function. Child Development, 81(6), 1641-1660. Best, J. R., Miller, P. H., & Naglieri, J. A. (2011). Relations between executive function and academic achievement from ages 5 to 17 in a large, representative national sample. Learning and Individual Differences, 21(4), 327-336. Miller, P. H., & Aloise, P. A. (1989). Young children's understanding of the psychological causes of behavior: A review. Child Development, 60(2), 257-285. Miller, P. H., Kessel, F. S., & Flavell, J. H. (1970). Thinking about people thinking about people thinking about...: A study of social cognitive development. Child Development, 41(3), 613-623. Miller, P. H., Blessing, J. S., & Schwartz, S. (2006). Gender differences in high‐school students’ views about science. International Journal of Science Education, 28(4), 363-381.