Wolfgang Schneider initially studied theology before expanding his interests to psychology and philosophy. His doctoral thesis "Conditional Analyses of Spelling", completed in 1979, and his habilitation "Development of Memory and Meta-Memory" (both supervised by Franz Emanuel Weinert) established a field of research that Schneider would successfully pursue and expand over many decades. Coming from the Max Planck Institute for Psychological Research in Munich, Schneider was appointed to the University of Würzburg in 1991.
Subsequent attempts to call him away were all successfully defended.