ProfessorSharon Naismith

Prof Naismith, AM is a Clinical Neuropsychologist, an NHMRC Leadership Fellow and holds the Leonard P Ullmann Chair in Psychology, based at the Charles Perkins Centre and Brain and Mind Centre. She founded and directs the Healthy Brain Ageing Program at the Brain and Mind Centre where she leads a team of >30 clinicians and researchers (see: https://www.sydney.edu.au/brain-mind/our-clinics/healthy-brain-ageing-clinic.html).

Prof Naismith conducts both clinical and health services research. She examines how modifiable dementia risk factors relate to cognitive decline, and designs and tests interventions to improve cognition.  She has co-authored >400 papers with >25,000 citations (google scholar). She has led seminal clinical research in the field of depression, sleep, cognitive interventions, and in health services across in the fields of mental health and neurodegeneration.  She uses a range of multidisciplinary research methods including detailed clinicial phenotyping, wearable devices, polysomnography, neuroimaging (MRI and PET) and biofluids and she has a strong interest in health services, health policy and in using implementation science methods for optimal research translation. 

The quality and impact of her work has been recognised by The Young Tall Poppy Award (2010), Society for Mental Health Research Oration (2019), the Australian Psychological Society Outstanding Contribution to Science (2020), the USYD Vice Chancellor’s Award for Outstanding Research (2020), the Society of Mental Health Research team award for research impact (2020), the International Neuropsychological Society Arthur Benton Mid-Career award (2023), the Australian Academy of Social Sciences (elected as fellow 2023), the NSW College of Clinical Neuropsychologists (2024) and the Australian Dementia Network Mid-Career Award (2025). In 2025, she received an Order of Australia (AM) for her distinguished contributions to the field of dementia and neuropsychology and for clinical practice.