Alison Carson

Dr. Alison Carson is the Associate Provost for Academic Innovation and Design Thinking and Director of Manhattanville's Design Thinking Center at Manhattanville College. She is also a Professor of Psychology with expertise in cultural psychology, design thinking, and culture learning.

Her research interests include:

• Cultural Psychology
• Design Thinking
• Culture Learning
• Immigration and Acculturation
• Communities of Practice and Situated Learning

Dr. Carson has conducted research comparing distributive justice reasoning between American and Filipino children and has explored how ePortfolios can catalyze transformation in teaching practices. Her cross-cultural work examines how cultural contexts shape concepts of fairness, while her educational research investigates how participation in communities of practice leads to teaching transformations through situated learning frameworks.

Her scientific awards include:

• Nominated as Faculty Member of the Year by Student Government Association
• 2012 Club Advisor of the Year Award, Psychology Club, Manhattanville University
• 2005 Donald J. White Teaching Excellence Award, Boston College
• 2001 Donald J. White Teaching Excellence Award, Boston College
• 1995 Elected member of Phi Beta Kappa
• 1994 Elected member of Psi Chi (National Psychology Honor Society)

Dr. Carson has worked closely with the Nursing school in developing creative strategies to enhance online learning environments and ran a campus-wide design thinking challenge to address pandemic-related issues including online learning challenges, social distancing, student enrollment, and community support. She has aided Manhattanville in starting their Design for America studio on campus, where students learn and apply design thinking to mission-focused issues. She explains that design thinking is 'a systematic and creative approach that supports the development of solutions to complex problems' with an emphasis on developing mindsets including 'curiosity and discovery, empathy, a growth mindset, grit, willingness to take risks, collaboration, creativity, a recognition of learning from failure.'