Dr. James Larsen

Office address
425 B
College of Education Building

Dr. James A. Larsen is an assistant professor of child development in the Reich College of Education. He earned a Ph.D. in human environmental sciences with an emphasis on early childhood development from the University of Missouri. Dr. Larsen also completed a postdoctoral research fellowship in the College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

Dr. Larsen’s research program focuses on the individual and contextual factors that influence the development of creative thinking skills in early childhood. He is particularly interested in exploring the ways caregivers, teachers, and early learning environments can nurture children’s creative potential and translating this knowledge into practice. His scholarship also tests new methodologies and measures for studying various dimensions of early childhood learning and development.

Connect with Dr. Larsen on LinkedIn.

Selected Publications

• Larsen, J.A. (2022). Measuring child-level originality through the strategic use of incubation periods during divergent thinking assessment. Thinking Skills and Creativity. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tsc.2022.101147.