Josephine F. Wilson was born and raised in upstate New York. At her undergraduate college (SUNY Fredonia), Wilson's professors encouraged and supported her interest in psychology and biology. She pursued graduate study in psychology at Columbia University, where she studied brain stimulation reinforcement, and obesity and eating behavior. She received her Ph.D. in physiological psychology from Columbia University and joined the faculty at Wittenberg University in 1985, receiving the Omicron Delta Kappa Distinguished Teaching Award for New Faculty in 1988 and the Wittenberg University Alumni Association Distinguished Teaching Award in 1993. In 2001, Wilson was appointed to the Paul Luther… Keil Chair in Psychology, a newly endowed faculty chair position at Wittenberg. Her ongoing research interests include food intake, eating disorders, alcohol intake, dental anxiety, and sex differences in route learning.