Professor Emeritus of Psychology
About
Irwin Pollack, Ph.D. professor of psychology in the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts and research scientist In the Mental Health Research Institute, retired from active faculty status on April 10, 1995, after a productive career as a research psychologist.
Born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Professor Pollack received his B.S. degree in 1945 from the University of Florida and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in 1946 and 1949, respectively, from Harvard University. Following his doctoral work, Professor Pollack was a research psychologist at the U.S. Navy Electronics Laboratory. He then served as director and senior research psychologist at the Air Force Operational Applications Laboratory prior to coming to the University of Michigan. In 1963, he received a joint appointment at Michigan as professor of psychology and research scientist.
Professor Pollack is internationally known for his novel approaches to the study of the auditory system. Over the span of his career, he was interested in the nervous system interpretation of auditory information. He recently focused on an experimental approach that distinguished between two general modes of processing sensory information: "within-signal" and ''between signal" sound comparison, which are necessary for auditory discrimination tasks. The long-term goal of his research was to improve our understanding of the human binaural system. Such understanding may well lead to new prostheses or signal processing procedures to aid localization of hard-of-hearing patients.
The Regents now salute this distinguished educator and scientist for his dedicated service by naming Irwin Pollack professor emeritus of psychology and research scientist emeritus.
