Current Projects
earlyBIRD
The earlyBIRD Project is a NIMH-funded effectiveness trial, which leverages an existing partnership between Power of Two and NYC’s Administration for Children Services (ACS). We will assess the effectiveness of varied dosages (3 vs 10 sessions) of the ABC intervention in enhancing parental sensitivity using a multi-method approach (behavioral observation, neural activity via event-related potentials [ERP]), and in enhancing child outcomes.
Geography of Parenting and Child Well-being Study (GPS)
The Geography of Parenting and Child Well-being Study (GPS) is designed to better understand the role that neighborhoods play in caregiving behaviors and early child development. Using a community-based participatory approach, this project seeks to bolster the voices of New York City parents and advocates of 3-5-year-old children through a multipart study. Study 1 will be 45-minute focus groups/listening sessions where parents can come together in a shared virtual space to discuss neighborhood factors that have shaped how they parent their children. Study 2 will be a 40-minute survey. Parents will be asked to fill out questions about their parenting styles and behaviors, their children's mental health, and other factors related to their own and their children's upbringing.
This project is funded through several mechanisms, including Stony Brook’s Center for Inclusive Education Turner Fellowship, the Stony Brook Department of Psychology John Neale Award, the Society for Research in Child Development’s Dissertation Award, the American Psychological Foundation (APF)/Division 56 Cultivating Healing, Advocacy, Nonviolence, Growth and Equity (CHANGE) award and the APF Graduate Research’s Ruth G. and Joseph D. Matarazzo scholarship.
CASPar
The CASPar study is being conducted in the context of an ongoing research-practice partnership with Power of Two, a community non-for-profit organization involved in the implementation and evaluation of the ABC intervention. The purpose of this research is to see if ABC helps parents think differently about their relationships with close others and if those changes, in turn, help facilitate warm and sensitive interactions between parents and their children.
Past Projects
SNAP (Shaping Neural Activity through Parenting)
The SNAP Project (funded by NIMH) leveraged a welldeveloped evidence-based parenting intervention (i.e., Parent-Child Interaction Therapy [PCIT]) to experimentally manipulate positive and harsh parenting in order to examine whether neural correlates of depression (RewP: Reward Positivity) and anxiety (ERN: Error-related negativity) could be altered in children. This mechanism-focused approach has the potential to inform neurobiological models of developmental psychopathology and offer novel targets for intervention.
ABC in NYC
With help from our partners at Power of Two in Brownsville, Brooklyn, the Attachment and Biobehavioral Catch-up (ABC) intervention helps caregivers provide nurturing care and engage in synchronous interactions with their infants. This occurs through a series of weekly parent training sessions in the parent’s home for 10 weeks, during which ABC helps caregivers re-interpret children’s behavioral signals so that they provide nurturance even when it is not elicited.
MICA (Mother Infant Cognition and Attachment)
The MICA Project aimed to examine predictors of variability in maternal sensitivity (to distress and non-distress) and the developmental sequalae associated with sensitive parenting. For this project, 100 mother-infant dyads were recruited from Long Island, NY and followed from 6-12 months (Time 1) through 12-18 months (Time 2). The sample was reassessed at preschool age (4-5 years old) for two follow-up projects [Sierra Kuzava’s dissertation examining longitudinal stability of maternal ERPs; and an NICHD-funded study of children’s telomere length].
