Oskar Pineño

Oskar Pineño is an assistant professor in the Department of Psychology at HofstraUniversity. He earned a B.S. and Ph.D. in psychology from Deusto University (Bilbao,Spain) and worked as a postdoctoral fellow in the Psychology Department at SUNYBinghamtonand, later, as a researcher in the Psychology Department at the Universityof Seville (Spain).

After spending one year studying computer science, Dr. Pineño realized that, as much ashe loved computers, that career just was not for him. The decision to change his majorwas made while sneaking into a class on psychology of perception, in which he becamefascinated with the topic. In his sophomore year, he joined Dr. Helena Matute’slaboratory, where he studied human associative learning for eight years. Although he stillconducts experiments in human learning, his passion lies in the animal laboratory. Afterconducting his first animal experiments with Dr. Mark E. Bouton (University of Vermont)and, later, with Dr. Ralph R. Miller (SUNY-Binghamton), he discovered the tremendouspotential of animal research and decided to devote his time to work with rats.

Dr. Pineño’s research, both with humans and rats, has always been theoretically driven.However, his current research attempts to model a real-life problematic behavior ofpotential clinical relevance. He currently teaches Principles of Learning and Behavior,Behavior Modification, and Fundamental Perspectives in Psychology. Amid teaching andresearch, he is also in the process of writing a nontechnical book for the general publicon animal learning. Dr. Pineño is looking for motivated students willing to work in theanimal laboratory. For more information about Dr. Pineño and his work, or to contacthim, visit his Web site at www.opineno.com.

Hofstra Horizons Articles

• Fall 2008: Animal Models of Human Misbehavior