After covering Capitol Hill for "Congressional Quarterly", Ripley learned to write long-form feature stories under editor David Carr at the "Washington City Paper". She then spent a decade working for "Time" magazine from New York, Washington and Paris. She covered the &lt;a href="9/11%20terrorist%20attacks"&gt;9/11 terrorist attacks&lt;/a&gt;, the anthrax investigation and Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, helping "Time" win two National Magazine Awards. Ripley has written three investigative nonfiction books about human behavior, including "The Smartest Kids in the World", a "New York Times" bestseller. In 2018, she became certified in conflict mediation and began training journalists to cover polarizing conflict differently, in partnership with the Solutions Journalism Network. Ripley writes op-eds for "The Washington Post" and feature articles for "Politico" and "The" "Atlantic", where she is a contributing writer.