Pamela Ansburg

Pamela Ansburg, Ph.D., is a professor in the Department of Psychological Sciences at Metropolitan State University of Denver. Her specialty is in experimental psychology.

Ansburg has been in the academia field for over two decades. She taught at as an assistant professor at Arkansas State University, Jonesboro and Slippery Rock University for almost four years before joining the Department of Psychology at MSU Denver in 1999. She was one of the founding faculty associates for the Undergraduate Research Program at MSU Denver, a highly successful campus-wide research conference. It was Ansburg’s vision and leadership that defined the program and she remains active on its advisory council. Her other professional affiliations include Society for Teaching of Psychology (APA Division 2) and Association for Psychological Science. Ansburg is also on the editorial board for the Student Journal of Psychological Sciences at MSU Denver.

Her research focuses on understanding the cognitive processes involved in remembering and using knowledge. In particular, Ansburg investigates how both task demands (task familiarity, working memory load, etc.) and individual differences (age, attentional focus, etc.) can impact the ability to learn, access, and apply information. Her most recent work was published in Educational Gerontology titled “Myth-Busting is a Bust for Patient Education: Making Salient Older Adults’ Misconceptions about Osteoarthritis Fails to Lead to Lasting Corrections.”

Ansburg received her doctorate in cognitive psychology from University of Illinois, Chicago, a master’s in psychology from University of Nevada, Reno and a bachelor’s in psychology from University of California, Riverside.