David was born in Satu Mare. In 1999 he obtained a Ph.D. degree in psychology from Babeș-Bolyai University with thesis Mecanisme inconștiente de reactualizare a informațiilor, under the direction of Ioan Radu.
National achievements
David created the first school of cognitive-behavioral therapy in Romania, based on international principles, recognized as such by the founders of this field such as Albert Ellis and Aaron T. Beck; he and his trainee also extended the application of CBT in education and organizational fields. He is a Fellow in the , U.S.A. and the national representative in the Social SciencesStanding Committee at the European Science Foundation. He is among those who introduced in Romanian academic psychology the evolutionary psychology and genetic counseling as modern interdisciplinary approaches between psychology and biology. David reintroduced and up-dated the Retman concept, and is the coordinator of the team that created the comics, stories and cartoons with this character. He has promoted the reform of Romanian clinical psychology and psychotherapy based on modern principles. Such a reform was necessary, taking into account that during the communist period of Romania both clinical psychology and psychotherapy were practically forbidden by the communist regime, and thus, the field was frozen in time. For example, after the communist era, Szondi and Lusher, among other projective test, were still commonly used for clinical testing. David, who studied in the U.S.A. for both his doctoral and postdoctoral studies, was one of the leaders of the first generations of psychologists after the anti-communist revolution of 1989, as since the 2000s, he has constantly been the most cited Romanian psychologist in the international literature. Given that he had several governmental and professional positions/leadership, he marked the reform of the clinical field in Romania, helping in moving the field from a '70s style approach to the modern one. For his merits in research and education he was knighted in 2008 by the President of Romania, in the National Order of Knights for Merit. Also, for the advanced research programs that he has initiated, in 2014, together with other important contemporary researchers, he received the innovation award, part of the "Foreign Policy Romania" Gala. In November 2017, he has been elected as the president of the Romanian Association of Psychologists, association which has been inactive for several years. The goals for his mandate are to reestablish the association as a professional and scientific body supporting the development of the professional practice in Romania. In March 2020, he was elected as the Rector of Babeș-Bolyai University for a four years mandate.
International achievements
He has contributed to the assimilation of cognitive science principles in the clinical field. A more specific contribution was focused on developing the theory and practice of rational-emotive and cognitive-behavioral therapies, which brought him both the Aaron T. Beck Award and the Albert Ellis Award of the . In 2004 he was invited as "Guest Editor" by the Journal of Clinical Psychology to organize a special issue titled: "Cognitive revolution in clinical psychology: Beyond the behavioral approach" in order to present the state-of-the-art regarding the impact of the cognitive revolution on the clinical field. As founding editor of the ', a Journal focused on evidence-based practice, he has supported the evidence-based approach in the clinical field. At this moment, is co-editor of the prestigious '. In 2013, the two research platforms, for Clinical Cognitive Neurosciences and the in Robotics/Robotherapy and Virtual Reality Psychotherapy, that he is coordinating as part of the , have both been included in .
Selected publications
David, D., Lynn, A., & Ellis, A. . Rational and irrational beliefs in human functioning and disturbances; Implication for research, theory, and practice. New York: Oxford University Press.
David, D.. Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy ; The view of a cognitive psychologist. In W. Dryden. Theoretical developments in REBT. London: Brunner/Routledge.
