A Distinguished Career: An Interview with Dr. Ray Novaco WRITTEN BY DAVID CENKNER Dr. Ray Novaco happily met with me at his favorite coffee shop & bakery, C'est si Bon, in Newport Beach. As we walked up to the counter, not only did the employee who was taking our order know Ray by his name, but many of the staff buzzing around the bakery took time to say hi to Ray. I asked him how he became so close with the bakery crew, and he said, "It all starts with paying attention to people.” Dr. Novaco was asked to participate in this spotlight interview because of his 40+ years career at the University of California, Irvine (UCI) and because he was instrumental in the creation and development of the Clinical Psychology PhD program at UCI. He discussed the longstanding mental health needs in the community and stated, “It was only over the past few years that our department could get the resources to support a clinical program.” After resources were accrued and with, "great clinical faculty, and an extraordinary DCT in Dr. Jason Schiffman," UCI was able to move forward with recruitment of its first class. I started the interview asking Dr. Novaco about his lab. He talked fondly of his three current graduate students, Klaudia Kosiak, Isaias Contreras, and Kaitlyn Hardin, that are a part of his Anger, Violence, and Psychopathology research team. To understand how Dr. Novaco became interested in anger, we took a brief dive through his educational history. When he enrolled at the University of Notre Dame as an undergraduate, he wanted to be a lawyer or a medical doctor. However, after taking a psychology class as a sophomore, his interests changed, and during his junior year he became immersed in psychological science, and he began to, “live and breathe psychology to understand human behavior.” Dr. Novaco was at the top of his class in the psychology department and was selected for Notre Dame's interdisciplinary Collegiate Scholar program, comprised of 6-7 students from various undergraduate majors. In this year-long program, the Scholars met weekly, along with a member of their individual faculty committees, in post-dinner 3-hour sessions to present their work. Debate was lively, and Dr. Novaco stated he, “Enjoyed the challenge of hard questions that came from the philosopher, the historian, and the political scientist." He continued, “You learn to ask yourself, how well grounded am I, and how well have I thought through these issues?” Dr. Novaco started doctoral studies in clinical psychology at the University
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