Vivienne Ming

Ming has spoken extensively on her academic struggle early in life, which eventually led her to leave university. After struggling with depression, suicide, and homelessness,[3][4][5] she returned ten years later and received her Bachelor of Science degree with honors in cognitive neuroscience from the University of California at San Diego in 2000.[1][6] She returned in 2016 to deliver the convocation at her alma mater.[6] Ming earned her Master of Science degree in 2003 followed by a PhD in 2006[7] in Psychology at Carnegie Mellon University, in parallel with the computational neuroscience program at the Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition.[8][9][10][2]

After her PhD, Ming held a joint postdoctoral fellowship at Stanford University and University of California, Berkeley, where she later joined as a research scientist and visiting scholar. Ming has been involved with various organisations that challenge poor education and health policy.[11] She co-founded the think tank Socos, which consults on artificial intelligence, neuroscience and education reform.[12][13] She demonstrated that the metrics used in hiring have little influence in workplace success.[12] She worked with Accenture on how they could train staff to be more creative.[12]

Ming has published research on Artificial intelligence (AI) in education[14] and created ”Muse”, a machine learning based tool for parents. It recommends research-based activities to support young people's creativity, motivation, and emotional intelligence.[15][16] She has led research showing that psychological constructs such as metacognition, socio-emotional competence, creativity, and curiosity significantly affect long-term life-outcomes such as health, productivity, education attainment, and life satisfaction.[17][18]