It is with an immense sadness that we inform you of the passing of Maria Benedicta Monteiro on the evening of November, 9th, 2017.

Maria was a social psychologist admired by her students and an irreplaceable colleague and friend.

Throughout her career, Maria was able to inspire her students and develop strong national and international bonds and research networks. Maria is a prominent figure and one of the founders of developmental social psychology.

Her work on aggression, intergroup conflict, discrimination, inequalities, negotiation and intergroup cooperation w​as​ enthusiastically received and discussed within our community. Her research has always been guided by the hypothesis that a social-developmental approach is paramount to a better understanding of discrimination and social inequalities and ​their underlying factors such as social status, dominance relations, social norms and socio-cognitive processes. A strong sign of the wide scope and reach of her work can be found in the book “The Social Developmental Construction of Violence and Intergroup Conflict” (Springer), a festschrift organized by former students and colleagues. The Portuguese community of psychologists recognized her role in psychology by awarding her the Portuguese Association of Psychology Career Award in 2010.

Maria's service to ISCTE-IUL, the University she worked at for over 25 years, including serving as the Chair of the Department of Social and Organizational Psychology, was admired by students and colleagues. But her activities and outreach were far beyond her work at the University. She gave hundreds of conferences in schools for both teachers and young students on multicultural relations and was a consultant for the Ministry of Education​ of Portugal​ for issues of Multiculturalism and intercultural education. Maria was cosmopolitan, a traveller who knew no borders, and a defender of diversity and freedom. For all these reasons, her wake was held at the Ecumenic Center of the city of Lisbon.