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An award is given each year at the national meetings of the American Academy of Psychodynamic Psychiatry and Psychoanalysis to the author(s) of the best article published in Psychodynamic Psychiatry during the preceding year. This year a prize of $2,500 was awarded to Sue Carter for her article entitled “The Role of Oxytocin and Vasopressin in Attachment” published in Psychodynamic Psychiatry, Volume 45, No. 4, 499-517. The editors of Psychodynamic Psychiatry congratulate Dr. Carter for this outstanding work.
Dr. Sue Carter is currently Director of the Kinsey Institute and Rudy Professor of Biology at Indiana University, a position she accepted in 2014. Prior to her current position she held Professorships at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana and the University of Illinois at Chicago, Department of Psychiatry, as well as the University of Maryland and the University of North Carolina. Dr. Carter is a neurobiologist, known for her research on the biology of social bonding and the development of the prairie vole as a model for studying the behavioral and physiological actions of peptide hormones. Research originated by Dr. Carter has shown that oxytocin is at the biological heart of positive emotions including love. Oxytocin and its receptors can facilitate a sense of safety, which in turn allows social cognition, social bonding, social support, growth and restoration. The oxytocin system also plays a major role in early life and is epigenetically influenced by experience. The capacity of oxytocin to regulate the brain and behavior across the lifespan helps to explain the adaptive consequences of social bonds and attachments for emotional and physical health, especially in the face of fear and anxiety.