R. Van Harrison is a Professor Emeritus in the Department of Learning Health Sciences at the University of Michigan Medical School. His training as a social psychologist emphasized individual behavior in organizational settings. A major interest is the evaluation and improvement of physician performance in the delivery of health care, including developing clinical guidelines, developing measures of clinical performance, and designing changes at the individual and organizational levels to improve care. He has studied the delivery of continuing medical education at medical schools and how better to align CME and quality improvement. His educational activities include teaching systems and quality improvement to physicians, residents, medical students, and graduate students.

Evaluation and improvement of physician performance in the delivery of health care, developing clinical guidelines, developing measures of clinical performance, designing changes at the individual and organizational levels to improve care quality and efficiency, continuing education of physicians, aligning individual interests and organizational goals