Larger nodes are co-authored paper collaborations; small nodes are partner countries in the Global Trauma Network. Filter by arm to see where each part of the question is pursued — Mechanisms spans the whole network, while Assessment and Intervention mark the sites where measurement and intervention work is concentrated. Hover any node for detail.
Active Now
Five projects in motion — each one an arm of the same question, pursued in a different place.
Current Projects
First Tones
A reward-based intervention, built by applying a mechanism established experimentally: communal music acts as a social reward, repairing positive affect and strengthening belonging after social ostracism (Scientific Reports, 2025). A randomized controlled trial (communal music vs. communal drawing) now tests whether that mechanism helps preschoolers facing familial adversity feel and function better, and why — measuring mental and behavioral health, reward responses via child-friendly fNIRS imaging, and sense of belonging through a new observation tool. Behavioral findings from the pilot are coming out soon.
Portion-Size Estimation in Eating Disorders
Portion perception is foundational to intake regulation: a portion must be perceived as large before it can trigger regulatory behavior. The Estimation Error Index (EEI) makes it measurable — a normalized index separating true perceptual distortion from scale-use artifacts. In anorexia and bulimia nervosa the distortion is magnitude-dependent, appearing specifically at large portions; the work now extends to binge-eating disorder, to culturally-relevant versions of the task, and into bariatric psychological assessment, where the EEI answers a gap in measuring eating psychopathology. A paper on the EEI in AN/BN is coming out soon.
Food Insecurity and Eating Disorders
Using repeated cross-sectional data from the Healthy Minds Study (N = 395,713 U.S. college students), this project asks how food insecurity relates to eating disorder screening. Positive SCOFF screens rise in graded fashion with food insecurity — from 26.5% among students reporting none to 42.7% among those reporting it often — and the association holds across social identity groups, though it attenuates substantially after adjustment for affective and socioeconomic factors. Differential item functioning across race and ethnicity groups was negligible, supporting the measurement equity of the screen.
Global Trauma Network
A 13-country collaboration (n ≈ 1,787) examining how child maltreatment and cultural social norms interact to shape mental health — depression, anxiety, trauma, resilience, and post-traumatic growth — across the US, Canada, Georgia, Germany, India, Iran, Israel, Macau, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye, and the UK. A paper is coming out soon.
The “Several Days” Problem in Depression Screening (PHQ-9)
Using the U.S. Healthy Minds Survey, this measurement work shows that the shared response option “several days” on the PHQ-9 and GAD-7 screeners spans a wider severity range for students who speak a non-English language at home — semantic non-equivalence of a translated anchor. Replicated across survey waves and echoing his finding in the PHQ-9 Brazilian-Portuguese version. A paper is coming out soon.