Claire St. Peter, Ph.D.

Dr. St. Peter received her Ph.D. in psychology with a specialization in behavior analysis in 2006 from the University of Florida. Dr. St. Peter joined the faculty at WVU in fall of 2006. She was promoted to Associate Professor in 2012 and Professor in 2019. She began serving as Department Chair in 2023. 

Dr. St. Peter’s primary research interest is use of reinforcement to build new skills that compete with previously unwanted behavior. Because building new skills often requires consistent intervention, she has a major line of research examining effects of incorrect or inconsistent implementation (called adherence, procedural fidelity, or treatment integrity). She has also done considerable work on impacts of sudden discontinuation of reinforcement-based interventions ("extinction"). 

She is interested and actively engaged in advising the next generation of applied behavior analysts. She may have the capacity to mentor new students, both undergraduate and doctoral, next year, and encourages interested parties to visit her laboratory website for more information.