David Alan Dunning

David Alan Dunning is the Mary Ann and Charles R Walgreen Jr Professor of the Study of Human Understanding and Professor of Psychology at the University of Michigan, serving as Associate Chair of the Department of Psychology within the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts. He is also a Faculty Associate at the Research Center for Group Dynamics, Institute for Social Research.

His research centers on the psychology of human misbelief, specifically how individuals maintain overly positive self-assessments of competence, character, and prospects without objective justification. This work examines implications across health, education, workplaces, and economic systems, while also investigating how these cognitive biases impair group judgments and collective decision-making processes.

Recent publications (2023-2025) reveal a concentrated exploration of overconfidence mechanisms, metaknowledge calibration, and expertise boundaries. His work consistently bridges cognitive psychology with organizational behavior, demonstrating how misjudgments manifest in scientific evidence interpretation, competitive contexts, and knowledge overclaiming across diverse populations.

Dunning's affiliation with the Research Center for Group Dynamics positions his work within broader investigations of social influence and interpersonal dynamics, connecting individual cognitive biases to group-level phenomena.