Dr. Daniel Marson

Daniel Marson, JD, PhD is a clinical neuropsychologist, licensed attorney, and Emeritus Professor in the Department of Neurology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). He directed the Department’s Division of Neuropsychology from 1995 to 2016 and the UAB Alzheimer’s Disease Center from 2005 to 2015. Dr. Marson graduated magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota (1976), and earned his JD at the University of Chicago Law School (1981) and his PhD in clinical psychology (geropsychology and neuropsychology specializations) at Northwestern University Medical School (1990). Dr. Marson has lectured nationally regarding competency and other medical-legal and ethical issues in dementia and other neurocognitive disorders. He has published over 130 papers, handbooks, and book chapters on these topics. He has been principal investigator on multiple National Institute of Health (NIH) funded studies of decisional and functional capacity in Alzheimer’s disease, mild cognitive impairment, and traumatic brain injury. His work on financial capacity in older adults has been featured in the New York Times, USA Today, BBC, Kiplinger Report, and NPR. At the national level, Dr. Marson is the past president and a fellow of the National Academy of Neuropsychology (NAN). He is a former member and chair of the Internal Ethics Committee of the Alzheimer’s Disease Cooperative Study, an NIH funded clinical trials group. He has served as a chartered reviewer at the NIH Center for Scientific Review.  Dr. Marson recently served as a member of the Commission on Law and Aging of the American Bar Association.   Dr. Marson frequently testifies as an expert witness in probate court matters involving older adults.  On a personal note, Dr. Marson has played the diatonic harmonica for many years and is a lover of blues, jazz, and folk music. He has published in the jazz magazine Downbeat.