Scienceאשר כהן

Asher Cohen

Asher Cohen is an Israeli psychologist who served as the 14th President of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem from 2017 to 2025.

born 1950President of the Hebrew UniversityResearch on attentionChair of university heads committee

Occupation: psychologist, university teacher
Education: Hebrew University of Jerusalem, University of Oregon

Asher Cohen was born in 1950

Asher Cohen was born in 1950 and grew up in the Shmuel HaNavi neighborhood of Jerusalem, one of 7 children in a Haredi family. His father's side descends from the Lipkin family of Hebron and Jerusalem, and his mother was born in Mea Shearim.

He served in the Signal Corps. He earned a B.A. in economics in 1979 and an M.A. in psychology in 1983, both at the Hebrew University. He received his doctorate in psychology from the University of Oregon in 1987 and did postdoctoral work there.

He taught psychology at Indiana University from 1989 to 1993. In 1992 he joined the Hebrew University's psychology department, becoming a full professor in 2005. He headed the department from 2008 to 2012 and was rector from 2012 to 2017.

His research covers cognitive psychology, especially attention, task performance and implicit learning. He built a model that predicts when doing 2 tasks at once lowers performance.

He became university president on September 1, 2017, and in July 2020 was chosen to chair the committee of university heads. He left the presidency in April 2025 and was followed by Tamir Sheafer. He is married to Gabriela, a German oboist.