Rollin McCraty, PhD, is director of research of the HeartMath Research Center at the Institute of HeartMath, an organization focused on understanding the heart’s role in health and mind-body healing. Since HeartMath’s inception in 1991, McCraty has worked with its founder, Doc Lew Childre, to set the course for learning more about how our mental and emotional systems affect the quality of our lives.
McCraty is recognized as an authority on heart-rate variability, heart-rhythm coherence, and the effects of positive and negative emotions on human psychophysiology. His research interests include the physiology of optimal function with a focus on the mechanisms by which emotions influence cognitive processes, behavior, and health. Findings from this research have been applied to the development of tools and technology to optimize individual and organizational health, performance, and quality of life.
A Fellow of the American Institute of Stress, McCraty holds memberships with the International Neurocardiology Network, American Autonomic Society, Pavlovian Society, and Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback, among others. He has acted as principal investigator in numerous laboratory and field research studies. His research team regularly participates in collaborative studies with other scientific, medical, and educational institutions around the world, including Stanford University, Wake Forest University, the Miami Heart Research Institute, and Claremont Graduate University.
Rollin McCraty’s research has been published in the American Journal of Cardiology, Journal of the American College of Cardiology, Stress Medicine, Biological Psychology, and Integrative Physiological and Behavioral Science.