Marc Brackett

Marc A. Brackett is a research psychologist, the Founding Director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, and a Professor at the Child Study Center at Yale University. Brackett earned his Ph.D. in psychology from the University of New Hampshire in 2003, where emotional intelligence scholar John D. Mayer supervised him. He was a postdoctoral fellow at Yale University with Mayer's collaborator, Peter Salovey.

Brackett's research focuses on the role of emotional intelligence in learning, decision-making, relationship quality, and mental health; the measurement of emotional intelligence; best practices for bringing emotional intelligence into schools and organizations; and the influences of dynamic intelligence training on students and educator effectiveness, bullying prevention, and school climate.

He is the author, co-author, and editor of over 125 scholarly publications and the developer of two university courses on emotional intelligence. His most recent book is Permission to Feel: Unlocking the Power of Emotions to Help Our Kids, Ourselves, and Society Thrive.

Brackett is the lead developer of RULER, an evidence-based approach to social-emotional learning that CASEL has approved. The acronym RULER refers to the five critical emotion skills: Recognizing, Understanding, Labeling, Expressing, and Regulating emotions. RULER intends to increase personal well-being, practical teaching and leadership, academic achievement, and classroom emotional climate change. An essential aspect of RULER involves training for educational leaders, teachers, support staff, students, and families. To date, RULER has been adopted by 2009 schools across the globe, reaching over 1,000,000 students.

Brackett's research extends to different cultures, including England, Spain, Italy, Australia, and China. In 2009, his work on social-emotional learning earned him the Joseph E. Zins Award. In addition, he received the 2004/2007 award for Excellence in Research from MENSA Education and Research Foundation. In 2017 he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Manhattanville College.