HDFS Department Research Projects
Interested in becoming involved in research and learning more about the work HDFS faculty do outside of the classroom? Check out the various research projects below and find out how to get involved.
- Promoting Positive Sibling Relationships in Middle Childhood Through the Siblings are Special Program
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Co-P.I.'s: Dr. Mark Feinberg and Dr. Susan M. McHale
Seeking graduate student researchers- Aims to help siblings learn skills and attitudes that will lead to more support and cooperation and less conflict in sibling relationships, using measures of self-reports and videotaped observations that assess family relationships and youth’s psychosocial adjustment
- Uses Siblings Are Special, a twelve-session after-school program for siblings in second through fifth grade
- Funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse
Read more about Promoting Positive Sibling Relationships in Middle Childhood Through the Siblings are Special Program
- Project SIESTA (Study of Infants’ Emergent Sleep Trajectories)
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Dr. Douglas M. Teti
Seeking graduate student researchers- A longitudinal study looking at linkages between infant sleep quality during the first two years and infant, how parenting of infants at bedtime and night time (from video-recordings), and the the role of parenting in predicting infant developmental outcomes and infant stress reactivity
- Funded by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
Read more about Project SIESTA
- Decision Making and Impulsivity
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Dr. Lisa Gatzke-Kopp; Child Brain Development Lab
Seeking graduate student researchers- Seeks to understand more about heterogeneity in the underlying deficits of children with ADHD, and how these deficits interact with family dynamics
- Assesses children who are currently medicated for ADHD, both on and off their medication, using EEG, ERP, cardiac, and electrodermal psychophysiological measures
- Neurobiological Mechanisms in Socioemotional Development
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Dr. Lisa Gatzke-Kopp; Child Brain Development Lab
Seeking graduate student researchers- Uses physiological data (EEG, ERP, cardiac and electrodermal measures) to examine moderators and mediators of intervention response to a socioemotional development program for children in kindergarten and 1st grade.
- Families and Communities in Transition (FACT)
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- Designed to examine the impact of television on population health and how technological changes impact communities, families, and individuals.
- Uses a randomized design where 14 unelectrified villages are randomly assigned to either treatment or control status. After baseline data collection, treatment villages will receive television while control villages will not.
- This research is highly significant as it will deliver the most rigorous assessments to date on television’s causal impacts on familial attitudes and behaviors. It is highly innovative in its reliance on an experimental design, its focus on the pathways through which effects might occur, its integration of multiple quantitative and qualitative data collection approaches (e.g., ethnography, survey research, content analysis, geographic information analysis), and its international and interdisciplinary research team. This large experiment has sufficient statistical power to detect potential effects (14 villages with approximately 4,000 respondents) and will advance our understanding on the causes of family change and the social impacts of mass media.
- The Workplace Practices and Daily Family Well-Being Project
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Dr. David M. Almeida
Seeking graduate student researchers- Uses daily diary interviews to study how both employees and their families are affected by an employer-initiated workplace program designed to improve employee flexibility
- Examines daily family processes and health, as well as psychological and physical health of employees' children, family setting temporal arrangements, and family resources
- Is part of the Work, Family & Health Network (WFHN), which is comprised of eight research organizations conducting studies on how best to improve the health of workers and their families and reduce work-family conflict, while also benefiting the organizations
- Funded by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, the National Institute on Aging, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the William T. Grant Foundation, and the Administration for Children and Families
Read more about the Workplace Practices and Daily Family Well-Being Project
- Family Relationships Project
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Dr. Susan M. McHale and Dr. Ann C. Crouter
- A set of studies that seeks to understand the family context of socialization in middle childhood and adolescence
- Funded by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
Read more about the Family Relationships Project
- Gender Diverse Parents Study
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Dr. Samantha L. Tornello
Seeking graduate student researchers
The purpose of this worldwide longitudinal internet based study was to gain insight into the diversity of non-cisgender parents and their families. The goal of the study was to examine the many ways families headed by non-cisgender parents have been created, explore their children's development, and learn more about family functioning.
Read more about the Gender Diverse Parent Study (www.genderdiverseparents.com)
- Intended Parent Study
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Dr. Samantha L. Tornello
Seeking graduate student researchers
The purpose of this study is to explore the experiences of young adults’ intention of becoming parents in the future and follow these future families overtime. This study has completed the first two waves of data collection with the third wave occurring in the summer of 2018/Fall 2018!
Read more about the Intended Parent Study (www.IntendedParentStudy.com)
- Gay and Bisexual Fathers Study
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Dr. Samantha L. Tornello
Seeking graduate student researchers
The purpose of this worldwide longitudinal internet based study was to gain insight into the diversity of gay/bisexual fathers and their families. The goal of the study was to examine the many ways families headed by gay/bisexual fathers have been created, explore how families function, and learn about the relationship between partners.
- Sexual Minority Stigma/Discrimination & Social Support Study
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Dr. Samantha L. Tornello
Seeking graduate student researchers
The purpose of this pilot study, framed by minority stress theory, will use semi-structured interviews and surveys to capture and understand how stigma/discrimination and social support experiences influence the well-being and functioning of same-sex female couples during the transition to parenthood and early childhood.
