associate professor

American  

noun

1. a teacher in a college or university who ranks above an assistant professor and below a professor.

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associate professor British  

noun

1. (in the US and Canada) a university teacher lower in rank than a full professor but higher than an assistant professor

2. (in New Zealand) a senior lecturer holding the rank below professor

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Other Word Forms

• associate professorship noun

Etymology

Origin of associate professor

First recorded in 1815–25

Example Sentences

Susan Enguidanos, an associate professor of gerontology at USC, researches and teaches end-of-life care.

From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 25, 2026

Kaya de Barbaro, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Texas at Austin, analyzed families with babies, synchronizing home audio recordings with the mothers’ smartphone use.

From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 25, 2026

“Wars are fought in two spaces,” said Narges Bajoghli, associate professor of Middle East Studies at Johns Hopkins University, in a recent Quincy Institute briefing.

From Barron's • Apr. 23, 2026

Food-inspired fashion has filtered down from luxury designers like Dolce & Gabbana which embraced it late last decade, says Lorynn Divita, an associate professor of apparel design and merchandising at Baylor University in Texas.

From BBC • Apr. 22, 2026

The second was Yale’s complacent refusal to accommodate its sought-after assistant professor’s request for a promotion to associate professor.

From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik