James E. R. Staddon is James B. Duke Professor of Psychology, and Professor of Biology Emeritus, at Duke University.  He obtained his BSc at University College, London, and his PhD in Experimental Psychology at Harvard University where he also did research at the MIT Systems Lab.

He has done research at Oxford University (UK), the University of São Paulo at Riberão Preto, the University of Mexico, the Ruhr Universität, Universität Konstanz and the University of Western Australia.  He is a fellow of several scientific organizations and has a Docteur, Honoris Causa, from the Université Charles de Gaulle, Lille 3, France.  He is a past editor of the journals Behavioural Processes and Behavior & Philosophy.

His experimental and theoretical research is on the evolution and mechanisms of learning in humans and animals; he has also written on the history and philosophy of psychology, economics and biology.   He has written and lectured on public-policy issues such as education, evolution, traffic control, the science , law and politics of smoking and the effects of social and psychobiological processes on financial markets.

He is the author of more than 200 research papers and ten books, including Scientific Method: How science works, fails to work or pretends to work.  Taylor and Francis (2016), Adaptive Dynamics: The Theoretical Analysis of Behavior, (MIT/Bradford, 2001), Adaptive Behavior and Learning 2nd edition (Cambridge University Press, 2016). The New Behaviorism: Foundations of behavioral science (3rd Edition) Taylor and Francis, 2021 and Science in an age of unreason (Regnery, 2022). He was profiled in the Wall Street Journal in January 2021 as commentator on the current problems of science.