Darcia Narvaez

Contact Information

Darcia Narvaez
Department of Psychology
University of Notre Dame
Notre Dame IN 46556
Phone: 574-631-7835
email: dnarvaez@nd.edu

Degrees

B.A. University of Northern Colorado
M. Div. Luther Northwestern Seminary
Ph.D., Educational Psychology, University of Minnesota

Honors/Awards

Fellow, American Psychological Association, Division 3: Experimental, 2008
Book Awards for Postconventional Moral Thinking and for Moral Development, Self and Identity

Educational research interests

Moral development and moral character education

Current educational studies

Spencer Foundation grant for a project called: “The Science of Virtue: Educating Expertise for Morally-Engaged Citizenship”

Select publications

Lapsley, D. K. & Narvaez, D. (2006). Character education. In Vol. 4 (A. Renninger & I. Siegel, volume Eds.), Handbook of Child Psychology (W. Damon & R. Lerner, Series Eds.) (pp. 248-296). New York: Wiley.

Narvaez, D. (2007). How cognitive and neurobiological sciences inform values education for creatures like us. In D. Aspin & J. Chapman (Eds.), Values Education and Lifelong Learning: Philosophy, Policy, Practices (pp. 127-159). Springer Press International.

Narvaez, D., & Gleason, T. (2007). The Influence of moral judgment development and moral experience on comprehension of moral narratives and expository texts. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, special issue (Nancy Eisenberg, editor), 168(3), 251–276.

Narvaez, D. & Lapsley, D. K. (2008). Teaching moral character: Two alternatives for teacher educators. Teacher Educator, 43(2), 156-172.

Narvaez, D. & Vaydich, J. (2008). Moral development and behaviour under the spotlight of the neurobiological sciences. Journal of Moral Education, 37(3), 289-313.

Bio

Darcia Narvaez, Associate Professor of Psychology, University of Notre Dame, studies moral cognition, moral development, and moral education. Before earning her Ph.D. in Educational Psychology, she was a K-12 teacher of classroom music, a middle-school Spanish teacher, a small-business owner, a church musician, and earned a master of divinity degree. She grew up living partly in Minnesota and partly in several Spanish speaking countries. She writes poetry on occasion and likes to cook.

Dr. Narvaez has formulated a new approach to character development education (integrating findings from social-moral development, positive psychology, cognitive psychology and expertise) that views character as a set of teachable capacities that can be coached and deliberately practiced as well as taught across the curriculum in standards-driven instruction. The character skills include those of ethical sensitivity, ethical judgment, ethical motivation, and ethical action. The model has been implemented across the state of Minnesota called “Community Voices and Character Education Project.” Dr. Narváez reported it on it at a Whitehouse conference. She appeared on the Department of Education’s television show,“Education News that Parents Can Use,” to discuss character development.