Encyclopedia of Psychopharmacology

Ian Stolerman received a PhD in Psychopharmacology at University College London in 1969. This was followed by postdoctoral experience at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine (NY) and the University of California, Los Angeles. He then moved to Birmingham and became a member of the MRC Neuropharmacology Unit. In 1980 he relocated to the Institute of Psychiatry, London where he remains as a member of the MRC External Scientific Staff. He heads the Section of Behavioural Pharmacology and is co-chair of the Institute’s addictions interdisciplinary research group.

As part of his efforts to raise the profile of the discipline of behavioural pharmacology, Ian Stolerman was a founder of the European Behavioural Pharmacology Society and became its first chairperson in 1986. Since 1992 he has been Co-Editor of the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence and he is now vice-President of the International Society of Addiction Journal Editors.

The Drug-discrimination Database, maintained by Professor Stolerman and funded by the US National Institute on Drug Abuse is a unique research tool for both students and research professionals interested in the neurobiological bases of addiction. The drug discrimination method is widely recognised as an invaluable method for studying the behavioural and neuropharmacological effects of psychoactive drugs and plays an important role in developing pharmacotherapies useful in treating psychiatric disorders and addiction.