Dr. Susan Painter

Susan Painter is a senior urban and university campus planner with AC Martin Partners, a Los Angeles planning, architecture and engineering firm. She also serves as a faculty member in the UCLA Architecture, Interior and Environmental Design program, where she has taught Human Factors in Design, and Fundamentals of Interior Design for eleven years. Previously, she was associate professor of psychology at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada. Painter received her Ph.D. in Psychology at the University of British Columbia and subsequently received her training in design at UCLA. She was elected a Fellow of the Canadian Psychological Association for distinguished service in 1989.

Painter has served as a campus planner for a variety of large and small campuses in Southern California, including California State University at Fullerton, Chico and Humboldt, Claremont Graduate University, and Azusa Pacific University. Her background as a specialist in human behavior and her twelve years as a university professor provide her with a unique perspective on the design of the university campus, and the impact of the campus plan and its buildings on students, faculty, staff, and visitors. Along with other colleagues in the fields of psychology, architecture and design, she has pioneered the new field of Design Psychology, in which psychology is used as a design tool. She has been a frequent presenter at professional psychology conferences and received an award from the Center for Healthcare Design for her design thesis, a pediatric clinic designed from a psychological framework.