Howard Giles

{{short description|American linguist}}

Howard Giles (born December 22, 1946) is a British-American social psychologist and a Distinguished Research Professor of Communication at the Department of Communication, University of California, Santa Barbara.

He was the chair of the department from 1991 to 1998, and has been president of both the International Communication Association and the International Association for the Study of Language and Social Psychology.{{cite web | url=http://www.comm.ucsb.edu/sites/secure.lsit.ucsb.edu.comm.d7/files/people/cv/GilesCV.pdf | title=Curriculum Vitae | publisher=Department of Communication, University of California, Santa Barbara | date=September 26, 2011 | accessdate=November 29, 2011 | author=Giles, Howard | url-status=dead | archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20141015071559/http://www.comm.ucsb.edu/sites/secure.lsit.ucsb.edu.comm.d7/files/people/cv/GilesCV.pdf | archivedate=October 15, 2014 }} He is the founding co-editor of the Journal of Language and Social Psychology{{cite web | url=http://www.ialsp.org/journal.html | title=Journals | publisher=International Association of Language and Social Psychology | accessdate=November 29, 2011 | url-status=dead | archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20120426010438/http://www.ialsp.org/journal.html | archivedate=April 26, 2012 }} and the Journal of Asian Pacific Communication,{{cite web | url=http://www.benjamins.com/#catalog/journals/japc/main | title=Journal of Asian Pacific Communication | publisher=John Benjamins | accessdate=November 29, 2011}} and was the editor of Human Communication Research from 1992 to 1995. He has received the Spearman Award and the President's Award from the British Psychological Society, and has also received the Mark L. Knapp Award from the National Communication Association. He is known for developing communication accommodation theory,{{cite book | last = Coupland | first = Nikolas | title = Style: Language Variation and Identity | publisher = Cambridge University Press | location = Cambridge, UK, New York | year = 2007 | isbn = 978-0-521-85303-3 | page = 62 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=oJE462b0kv4C&pg=PA62 | accessdate = November 29, 2011}} and has diverse research interests in the areas of applied intergroup communication research and theory.{{cite book | last1 = Giles | first1 = Howard | last2 = Reid | first2 = Scott | last3 = Harwood | first3 = Jake | title = The Dynamics of Intergroup Communication | publisher = Peter Lang | location = New York | year = 2010 | isbn = 978-1-4331-0398-8 | page = 319 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=FOJErZQA8d0C&pg=PA319 | accessdate = November 29, 2011}}

Giles was born in Cardiff, Wales. He earned his B.A. in psychology from Bangor University and his Ph.D. in Social Psychology from the University of Bristol.