Darcia Narvaez

Dr. Darcia Narvaez is Professor of Psychology at the University of Notre Dame who focuses on moral development and flourishing from an interdisciplinary perspective. Dr. Narvaez’s current research explores how early life experience and societal culture interact to influence virtuous character in children and adults. She integrates neurobiological, clinical, developmental and education sciences in her theories, research and writing about moral development, parenting and education. She has identified the evolved nest as critical for moral formation, multi-ethics meta-theory as a framework for how moral mindsets can shift or become dispositional from experience, integrative ethical education (via RAVES: relationship, apprenticeship, virtue exemplars, ethical expertise, self-authorship), and indigenous wisdom for fostering optimal moral functioning (relational attunement and communal imagination).

Dr. Narvaez is a fellow of the American Psychological Association and the American Educational Research Association. She has authored or edited more than 20 books and many papers. Her recent books include: Indigenous Sustainable Wisdom: First Nation Know-how for Global Flourishing (edited with Four Arrows, E. Halton, B. Collier, & G. Enderle); Basic Needs, Wellbeing and Morality: Fulfilling Human Potential and Embodied Morality: Protectionism, Engagement and Imagination. One of her recent authored books, Neurobiology and the Development of Human Morality: Evolution, Culture and Wisdom, won the 2015 William James Book Award from the American Psychological Association and the 2017 Expanded Reason Award.

She writes a popular blog for Psychology Today (“Moral Landscapes”) and hosts the webpage EvolvedNest.org. She is a member of the Advisory Board of Your Whole Baby.

See also

• Your Whole Baby