professor of psychology at Florida State University and director of the university’s Attention and Training Lab
Walter BootWalter R. Boot, Ph.D., is a professor of psychology at Florida State University and director of the university’s Attention and Training Lab. He received his PhD from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in Visual Cognition and Human Performance in 2007. Walter is one of six principal investigators of the multi-disciplinary Center for Research and Education on Aging and Technology Enhancement (CREATE), a long-standing and award winning National Institute on Aging funded center dedicated to ensuring that the benefits of technology can be realized by older adults. He is also co-director of the ENHANCE (Enhancing Neurocognitive Health, Abilities, Networks, & Community Engagement) Center, funded by the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research, with a focus on how technology can support older adults living with cognitive impairment, including mild cognitive impairment and traumatic brain injury. His research interests include how humans perform and learn to master complex tasks (especially tasks with safety-critical consequences), how age influences perceptual and cognitive abilities vital to the performance of these tasks, and how technological interventions can improve the well-being and cognitive functioning of older adults. He has published extensively on the topic of technology-based interventions involving digital games. Walter is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association (APA) and the Gerontological Society of America, and received the Springer Early Career Achievement Award from Division 20 (Adult Development and Aging) of APA in 2014, and the Earl A. Alluisi Early Career Achievement Award from Division 21 (Applied Experimental and Engineering Psychology) of APA in 2017.