Dr. Pam King

Biography

As the Peter L. Benson Professor of Applied Developmental Science and the executive director of the Thrive Center for Human Development, Pamela King’s academic and applied efforts aim to promote a movement of human thriving that contributes to flourishing societies.

Her primary research interests lie at the intersection of thriving and spiritual development. She is passionate about understanding what individual strengths and environments enable diverse humans to grow individually, relationally, and aspirationally. She holds particular interest in understanding the role of faith, spirituality, religion, and virtue in this process. To this end she has led in building an empirical field of study of religious and spiritual development within developmental psychology that provides a psychological science perspective of spiritual formation.

King is has authored, coauthored, and edited numerous books and journal publications. She has served on the editorial boards of Developmental Psychology, Journal of Positive Psychology, Applied Developmental Science, the Encyclopedia of Applied Developmental Science, and the Encyclopedia of Spiritual Development in Childhood and Adolescence. King is a member of the Society for Research on Adolescents, Society for Research on Child Development, and Division 36 of the American Psychological Association.

In addition to her studies at Fuller, King completed her undergraduate studies at Stanford University and a postdoctoral fellowship at Stanford’s Center on Adolescence; she was a visiting scholar under the divinity faculty at Cambridge University. Ordained in the Presbyterian Church (USA), she has led high school and college ministries and regularly speaks, preaches, and consults for various community organizations and churches. She lives in Pasadena with her husband, Brad, and their three children.