Mental health problems in children and adolescents have increased dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic. Lab Director, Katie A. McLaughlin, speaks with Audie Cornish on National Public Radio's All Things Considered about the impact of the pandemic on child mental health and what schools can do to promote student well-being during the transition back to in-person schooling this fall.
Research published this week by the Stress and Development Lab examines predictors of youth mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic, and identifies factors that families engage in that could help promote better mental health for children during the pandemic. We examined these questions in two longitudinal studies of children and adolescents in the Seattle area whose mental health had been assessed prior to the pandemic, so we could examine changes in mental health during the pandemic--both during the stay-at-home orders and approximately 6 months later. ...
Spanking remains a common form of discipline in the United States and around the world, despite the fact that numerous studies have found higher rates of depression, anxiety, behavior problems, and difficulties in school among children who experienced this type of corporal punishment relative to children who have never been spanked. Research from the Stress and Development Lab published in Child Development suggests that spanking is associated with changes in children's brain function that are similar to those observed in children exposed to more severe forms of child abuse. ...
Eli Susman, Rachel Martino, and Jimmy Huettig, current research coordinators in the Stress and Development Lab, have all been recognized by the National Science Foundation for their applications to the Graduate Research Fellowship Program for 2021!
The NSF GRFP is a highly-competitive fellowship intended to fund promising doctoral students in STEM-related master’s and doctoral programs.
Rachel and Jimmy's applications have received honorable mention, and they will have...
Lab Director, Katie A. McLaughlin, speaks with the Harvard Gazette about child mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic. The interview discusses the lessons learned from research on natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina and exposure to other types of stressful life events about how the pandemic is likely to shape child mental health over the coming years. Dr. McLaughlin also discusses ongoing research from the Stress and Development Lab that identifies factors that promote resilience against stress-related mental health problems in children during the pandemic. Read the full...
David Weissman, a post-doc in the Stress and Development Lab has been awarded a Young Scientist Transition Award from the Harvard Brain Science Initiative. The Young Scientist Transition Awards, made possible with funding from the Office of the Provost, are designed to provide relief funding to neuroscience postdocs at Harvard University whose career progress has been significantly delayed by institutional shutdowns, slowdowns and delays in job search processes caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. ...
Rachel Romeo, post-doctoral fellow in the Stress and Development Lab, has received the K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award from the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development. Her project is entitled “Language Input as a Mechanism Underlying Socioeconomic Disparities in Neurocognitive Development.” On average, children from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds exhibit disparities in academic achievement and cognitive development, compared to children from higher socioeconomic status (SES) backgrounds. Rachel’s studies will investigate the role of specific dimensions of... Read more about Post-Doc Rachel Romeo awarded a K99/R00 Pathway to Independent Award from NICHD
In a meta-analysis with over 100,000 participants published in Psychological Bulletin, Stress and Development Lab research demonstrates that experiencing adversity in childhood is associated with accelerated biological aging across three separate metrics of aging - the timing of puberty, indicators of cellular aging, as well as patterns of brain development. Importantly, however, these effects were not observed for all types of early adversity. Only exposure to violence or experiences that involve a significant threat to the child were associated with this acceleration in the...
Maya Rosen, research associate in the Stress and Development Lab, has received the K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award from the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development. Her project is entitled “Neurodevelopmental mechanisms linking environmental experience and executive function.” Socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with differences in cognitive and academic outcomes with children from disadvantaged backgrounds have lower performance than their advantaged counterparts. Maya’s studies will investigate environmental and neurodevelopmental mechanisms explaining SES-... Read more about Research Associate Maya Rosen awarded a K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award from NICHD
