Maya Shankar
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University of Oxford (DPhil)
Maya Shankar | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Senior Advisor at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy[1] | |
| In office April 2013 – January 19, 2017 | |
| President | Barack Obama |
| Chair of Social and Behavioral Sciences Team[1] | |
| In office September 2015 – January 19, 2017 | |
| First Behavioral Science Advisor to the United Nations | |
| In office January 2016 – October 2016[2] | |
| President | Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon |
| Personal details | |
| Spouse | Jimmy Li |
| Education | Yale University (BA) University of Oxford (DPhil) |
| Website | mayashankar |
Maya Shankar is a cognitive scientist and the host and executive producer of the podcast, A Slight Change of Plans.[3]
Podcast: A Slight Change of Plans
A Slight Change of Plans was first published in 2021 by Pushkin Industries, the media company co-founded by Malcolm Gladwell and Jakob Weisberg.[3]
A Slight Change of Plans explores what happens after a person experiences a life-changing event. It’s inspired by Shankar’s experience as a young classical violinist, training at Juilliard, whose career was cut short by an injury. “My whole childhood revolved around the violin, but that changed in a moment when I injured my hand playing a single note,” said Shankar. “I was forced to try and figure out who I was, and who I could be, without it.” [4]
On the show, Shankar interviews people who have lived through different kinds of big changes — accidents, deaths, kidnappings — to understand how they navigated the waters ahead. The show emphasizes the universality of human psychology to help listeners feel less alone with their own choices. Shankar explains: “Cognitive science teaches us that the strategies we use to navigate those changes can be quite similar. Which is heartening to realize!” [4]
A Slight Change of Plans was named the Apple Podcast of the Year in 2021.[4] In 2023, it won the Ambie Award for Best Personal Growth Podcast.[5] In 2022, Shankar earned a Webby nomination for Best Podcast Host.[6]
Career in behavioral science
Shankar served as a senior advisor in the Obama White House, where she founded the White House Social and Behavioral Sciences Team,[7] which was formalized by Executive Order 13707 in 2015.[8] Her work at the White House was profiled by The New Yorker in 2017.[9]
Shankar also served as the first Behavioral Science Advisor to the United Nations.[10] She is a Director at Google.[11]
Early career as a musician
Shankar is a graduate of the pre-college program at the Juilliard School, where she was a private violin student of Itzhak Perlman.[12] When she was a teenager, she injured a tendon in her left hand, bringing her musical career to an end.[13][14]
Education
Shankar earned her B.A. from Yale University in cognitive science and went on to earn her Ph.D. from the University of Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship. In 2013, Shankar completed her postdoctoral fellowship in cognitive neuroscience at Stanford University.[15] She attended high school at the Juilliard School PreCollege program.[12]
