Allan Paivio is the author of a general theory of cognition, called dual coding theory, which assumes that all human cognition entails the cooperative activity of multimodal verbal and nonverbal (especially imagery) processing systems. The theory has guided his research for more than 40 years on problems related to memory, language, and other aspects of cognition. It was the basis of the model used for the construction of the SIQ. The theory and research have been described in more than a hundred publications out of a total of about 200 to date—scholarly chapters, research articles, and 5 books. The theory is extended in a sixth book on “Mind and its evolution: A dual coding theoretical interpretation” (Erlbaum, forthcoming).

Dr. Paivio received his PhD from McGill University in 1959. Since 1962, he has been at UWO, where he is now emeritus professor.