Elizabeth Skowron

• Child Maltreatment Solutions Network
• Social Science Research Institute co-funded faculty member

Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, 2025-present

• Professor, Department of Human Development and Family Studies
• Associate Director, Child Maltreatment Solutions Network
• Member, Social Sciences Research Institute

University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, 2012-2025

• Professor, Departments of Psychology & Counseling Psychology and Human Services
• Professor Emeritus of Psychology (2025)

Pennsylvania State  University, University Park, PA, 2001-2012

• Assistant to Associate Professor, APA-accredited Ph.D. counseling psychology program
• Doctoral program training director (2007-2009)
• Faculty Affiliate, Children, Youth, and Families Consortium, Child Study Center, & Institute for Neurosciences

University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, WI, 1998-2001

• Assistant Professor, APA-accredited Ph.D. program in counseling psychology. 

T32 MH070327. NIH T32 Training Grant – Child Maltreatment Science. NIH; PIs: Erika Lunkenheimer & Hanna Schrier

• Faculty Mentor

 R01DA036533. Targeting neurobiological and behavioral mechanisms of self-regulation in high-risk families. Funded: $3,566,916. NIH/NIDA 4/15/2015 to 1/31/2022.  PI: Skowron            

This study comprises a randomized controlled trial of Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT) for child maltreatment and tests the effects of PCIT on neurobiological indices of self-regulation and behavior in CM parents and their elementary-school children. The goal is to identify the neurobiological mechanisms of parenting changes that may inform how parenting interventions designed to reduce child maltreatment are optimized, triaged, dosed, assessed, and sustained, and how they generate parallel improvements in children’s self-regulation.

• Principal Investigator

 R01DA036533-06S2. Metabolomics Supplement. PI: Skowron. Funded: $98,337  NIH/NIDA 08/01/19—01/31/22. PI: Skowron

This supplement leveraged our supplemental collection of blood samples from 150 parent-child dyads in the parent project to investigate biological pathways that link exposure to CM with children’s health outcomes and explore the efficacy of Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT) for modifying inflammatory markers of immune system functioning in CM mothers and their children. Assays target assessment of intervention-driven change in circulating inflammatory markers, and indicators of metabolic function observed at a cellular level. This project is expected to yield critical preliminary insights into the biological embedding of stress on immune system functioning.

• Principal Investigator 

R01 MH111758. Preschooler emotion regulation in the context of maternal borderline personality disorder.  NIH/NIMH PI: Zalewski. 05/01/17-02/28/22. 

This study leveraged Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills as an experimental intervention to determine if preschool emotion regulation develops more rapidly because of improvements in mothers’ ability to regulate her own emotion.

• Co-Investigator 

2016-ZD-CX-K008. Planning A Family-focused Approach to Prevent Elder Mistreatment. Funded: $400,000. NIJ 1/1/2017 to 7/31/2018. PI: Wilber, Kathleen; Co-PI: Mosqueda, Laura. 

This study comprised development of a novel elder mistreatment intervention, the Strengths-based Training on Prevention of Elder Mistreatment (STOP EM), building on lessons learned from preventing other forms of family violence, including child maltreatment and intimate partner violence. Adults aged 65 and older at-risk of Elder Mistreatment because of health care transitions and changing health care needs will participate. The current proposal was for the first of three phases of a cooperative agreement with the National Institute of Justice (NIJ). Team leaders at USC worked in collaboration with the NIJ, a primary health plan partner (Kaiser), and other stakeholders to fully plan the STOP EM program. Following the completion of this initial 18-month planning period, a pilot phase was proposed. Upon completion of the pilot phase, a multi-year demonstration of the STOP EM intervention program will be considered to allow for a full assessment of its efficacy.

• Consultant

National Science Foundation 1539698. Effects of early adversity on autonomic and neural mechanisms underlying self-regulation.  NSF, 08/15/15-07/31/18.  Funded: $594,785.   PI: Neville 
The goals of this grant were to:  1.  determine the differential contributions of parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous system (PNS/SNS) mechanisms associated with behavior and brain function for attention and self-regulation in young children and adults; 2. determine the extent to which PNS and SNS functions interact with the neural response to feedback and errors in self-regulation on a trial-by-trial basis; and 3. develop and refine models of the role of PNS and SNS functions in the relationship between early adversity and behavior and brain function for attention and self-regulation.

• Co-Investigator  

90YR0076-01-00. Broad Implementation of a Successful Dual-Generation Intervention in Partnership with Head Start of Lane County.  DHHS/Administration for Children and Families, 05/01/14 to 04/30/19. Funded: $2,104,500.  PI: Neville 

The goals of this grant were to: 1) scale up a successful two-generation intervention program for broad implementation within the Head Start program structure, 2) characterize distal changes in parent and family well-being as a result of an evidenced-based parenting intervention, including health and safety, parental education, financial literacy and decision making, and biomarkers of allostatic load, and 3) evaluate hypothesized factors mediating intervention outcomes, specifically stress and self-regulation in parents and children.

• Co-Investigator

5R01 MH079328. Parent-Child Processes: Negative Self-Regulatory and Behavioral Outcomes.  National Institute of Mental Health, 9/11/2007 to 6/30/2013.  Funded: $2,300,000.

This project examined patterns of family emotional process in dyadic interactive coordination in maltreating and non-maltreating mother-preschooler dyads and examined linkages with physiological and behavioral indicators of self-regulation in mothers and children. 

• Principal Investigator

1R01HD068594-01. Caregiving, Attachment and Regulation of Emotions NIH/NICHD. Funded: $2,209,108.  PI: Woodhouse. 2012-2017                                  

This study examined a sample of racially and ethnically diverse, urban, low-SES mothers and infants to examine the relative predictive utility of competing conceptualizations of maternal caregiving in predicting infant stress reactivity, physiological indicators of emotion regulation, and behavioral problems (e.g., internalizing and externalizing problems), and later emotion regulation. 

• Co-Investigator

The development of novel analytic strategies to integrate physiological and behavioral measures.  PI: Gatzke-Kopp. Penn State Institute of Neurosciences 

The goal of this research was to develop and establish validity of novel statistical approaches for modeling continuous streams of physiological data for use in study of intersection of physiology and behavior (i.e., parenting interactions).  2010-2012. Funded: <$20,000.

• Co-investigator

Integrating Neurobiology and Family Context to Understand Treatment Response in Attention-Deficit/ Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) PI: Gatzke-Kopp. Penn State University Children Youth & Families Consortium Level II Grant. 2008-2010. Funded: <$20,000.      

• Co-Investigator

Parent self-regulation, family communication patterns, child neglect, and school readiness.  Penn State University, Children, Youth, and Families Consortium Level II Grant.  2004-07. Funded: $22,588

• Principal Investigator

Distinguishing Parent-Child Communication Patterns in Families with High vs. Low Child Abuse Potential.  The Pennsylvania State University, College of Education Research Initiation Grant.  2002-03. Funded: $6,320.

• Principal Investigator

The Development and Validation of the Differentiation of Self Inventory.  University at Albany, State University of New York Benevolent Association, 1994. Research Grant.  Funded: $500.

• Principal Investigator

Awards and honors

• Rippey Innovation Teaching Award, University of Oregon College of Arts & Sciences, 2024
• Social Sciences Research Institute (SSRI) Faculty Fellowship, Pennsylvania State University.  Project title: “Neurobiology of parenting-at-risk," 2012
• Fellow, American Psychological Association, Division 17: Society of Counseling Psychology, 2011
• Fellow, American Psychological Association, Division 43: Society of Family Psychology, 2010
• U.S. Fulbright Scholar, National University of Ireland at Galway, Ireland, 2009-10
• Distinguished Doctoral Dissertation Award, University at Albany, State University of New York, 1995
• Dissertation Award, American Psychological Association Science Directorate: Development and Validation of the Differentiation of Self Inventory, 1994