Introduction to the 2004 Rumelhart Prize Special Issue Honoring John R. Anderson

This special issue honors the research and mentorship contributions of Dr. John R. Anderson, the 2004 David E. Rumelhart Prize recipient. This prize was instituted in 2001, funded by the Robert J. Glushko and Pamela Samuelson Foundation. The prize is awarded annually to an individual or collaborative team making a significant contemporary contribution to the formal analysis of human cognition. Mathematical modeling of human cognitive processes, formal analysis of language and other products of human cognitive activity, and computational analyses of human cognition using symbolic or nonsymbolic frameworks all fall within the scope of the award. In 2004 the prize selection committee consisted of Alan Collins, Robert Glushko, Mark Liberman, Anthony Marley, and James McClelland (chair). Perhaps best known for his contributions to connectionist or neural network models, Dr. Rumelhart also exploited symbolic models of human cognition, formal linguistic methods, and the formal tools of mathematics. Reflecting this diversity, the first three winners of the David E. Rumelhart Prize are individuals whose work lies within three of these four approaches. Past recipients are Geoffrey Hinton, a connectionist modeler, Richard M. Shiffrin, a mathematical psychologist, and Aravind Joshi, a formal and computational linguist. Anderson is the leading proponent of the symbolic modeling framework, thereby completing coverage of the four approaches.