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Patrick Smith, Ph.D.

  • Professor of Psychology
Patrick Smith

Dr. Smith studied Psychology at Elizabethtown College, from which he received his B.A. in 1996. He immediately entered into the doctoral program in Neuroscience at the Florida State University where he was awarded a fellowship as part of the Chemosensory Training Program. Dr. Smith earned his MS degree in 2000, in which he explored abilities in textural discrimination of solid foods. While pursuing his doctorate, Dr. Smith became recognized as a successful teacher and mentor to undergraduates, as he was awarded the Florida State University Outstanding Teaching Award for Graduate Students in 2002 as well as the Joseph Grosslight Scholarship for Teaching Excellence in 2002. He completed his Ph.D. in Neuroscience in 2003. His dissertation explored the interactions between taste and thermal cues that influence feeding behavior. Dr. Smith came to Florida Southern in 2003, where he immediately made an impact among the students both inside and outside the department. Although Dr. Smith has taught virtually every class in the Psychology curriculum, his areas of specialty lie in Behavioral Psychology, Neuroscience, Sensation and Perception, and Psychology in Film. For his leadership and service among the college and Lakeland communities, he has received other honors, including faculty induction into both Phi Eta Sigma and Omicron Delta Kappa and service awards such as the Florida Southern College Faculty Service Award (2007) and the Marsha Merritt Community Service Award (2009).

Outside the classroom, Dr. Smith has been an avid researcher who has mentored numerous presentations with students at regional and national conferences. These projects span a great range of professionally relevant topics in psychology that include the sensory influences within advertising, cognitive and social judgments of non-traditional art media, the characterization of personality traits within social media, the depiction of psychological themes within film, and engagement strategies for more effective teaching of undergraduate psychology.