Elaine Reese is Professor of Psychology at the University of Otago. She is an American-New Zealand developmental psychologist who has researched the impact of stories on children's and adolescents' development and well-being for over 30 years. Her focus is on how parents and teachers in diverse cultures support young people's language, literacy, and socioemotional development through the stories they share from books and real-life experiences. Reese received her B.A. in Psychology from Trinity University, her M.A. and Ph.D. from Emory University, and has taught at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand, and at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts. She served as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Cognition and Development and as an advisor to the longitudinal birth cohort study Growing Up in New Zealand. She is currently leading a national early childhood education study called "Kia Timata Pai: The Best Start Study", and her book for parents is called Tell Me a Story: Sharing Stories to Enrich Your Child's Life (Oxford, 2013). She is an elected Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand/Te Aparangi.