Meet Our Team | Penn State College of Health and Human Development

Kathleen Keller and the members of her Children's Eating Behavior Lab.

Principal Investigator

Kathleen L. Keller is the principal investigator of the Children's Eating Behavior Lab and professor of nutritional sciences. She received her doctoral degree in nutritional sciences from Rutgers University and completed a post-doctoral fellowship at Columbia University in pediatric obesity. Following her post-doctoral fellowship, she was an Assistant Research Professor at Columbia for five years and studied childhood eating behaviors.

She joined Penn State in 2012 as a dual-funded faculty member with the Department of Nutritional Sciences, the Social Science Research Institute, and the Department of Food Science and has led the Children's Eating Behavior Lab since then.

Our Team

Meet the faculty, staff, and graduate students who make our research possible.

Benjamin Baney

Research Coordinator

Summary Statement

Ben, a Penn State communications alumnus with hospitality experience, is the research coordinator for the REACH Study. He explores how ads affect the brain and kids' eating, aiming to bring research to the mainstream and positively impact his community.

Department

Nutritional Sciences - NUTR

bab349@psu.edu

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Yashaswini Bhat

Advisor, Kathleen Keller
Metabolic Kitchen and Children's Eating Behavior Laboratory

Summary Statement

Yashaswini's research interests include predictive modeling and machine learning applications for childhood obesity and eating behaviors.

Department

Graduate Student

ybr5070@psu.edu

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Kyle Hallisky

Advisor, Kathleen Keller
Metabolic Kitchen and Children's Eating Behavior Laboratory

Summary Statement

Kyle's research interests include neural and cognitive mechanisms underlying eating behavior and appetite regulation in children.

Department

Graduate Student

kmh6587@psu.edu

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Kathleen L. Keller

Professor, Department of Nutritional Sciences
Director Metabolic Kitchen and Children's Eating Behavior Laboratory

Summary Statement

Eating behaviors in children; neural mechanisms of taste preference and eating behaviors in children; food marketing and childhood obesity; genetic and neural influences in taste in children.

Department

Nutritional Sciences - NUTR

Phone

814-863-2915

klk37@psu.edu

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Rhea Sarma

Advisor, Kathleen Keller
Metabolic Kitchen and Children's Eating Behavior Laboratory

Summary Statement

Rhea's research interests include ingestive Behavior, appetite regulation, satiety response, eating in absence of hunger (EAH), and fMRI.

Department

Graduate Student

rvs6115@psu.edu

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