Anita Thapar Ph.D., FRCPsych, CBE, FMedSci, is a clinical academic child and adolescent psychiatrist. She heads the academic Child & Adolescent Psychiatry section at the Division of Psychological Medicine and Clinical Neurosciences, Cardiff University.

Her research focuses on 1) the origins, development and complications of child and adolescent neurodevelopmental disorders focusing mainly on ADHD and 2) adolescent depression.

In 2015 and 2025, she served as lead editor (together with Dr. Daniel S. Pine, NIMH) of the authoritative international textbook Rutter's Textbook of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. She has served on Welsh Government Child and Adolescent Mental Health Policy groups and is also on the Ministerial Advisory Group for neurodiversity and Chair of the NHS England ADHD Taskforce in 2024/5.

Anita was awarded the World Federation of ADHD Lifetime Achievement Award in 2025k, CBE (Queen’s honor) for services to Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in 2017, the President’s Medal from the Royal College of Psychiatrists in 2015 for contributions to policy, public knowledge, education and meeting population and patient care needs and the Ruane Prize 2015 from the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation, USA for outstanding Child & Adolescent Psychiatric research.