Research conducted in The Health and Coping Lab examines social, developmental, and cognitive influences on stress, coping, and physical health. Our primary areas of focus include women's and infants' health, cognitive mediators of physiological stress responses, and the influence of childhood experiences on psychological and physical health in adulthood.

Lab News!

Amy Kraft successfully defended her dissertation: "Family conflict, cognition, and physiology", a study of the cardiovascular and neuroendocrine effects of early life exposure to a high conflict family environment.

Jenna Gress successfully defended her master's thesis: "Child resilience and bereavement: A Resilience Index:, a study examining the resilient response to parental death as a multi-dimentional construct.

Dr. Linda Luecken, Dr. Keith Crnic, and Dr. Nancy Gonzales were awarded a 5-year NIH grant "Coregulatory Mechanisms and Postpartum Depression in low-income Mexican American women". The project began 2/20/2009 and will follow 330 mothers and their infants for the first postpartum year.

The Health and Coping Lab is happy to announce the publication of the book, Handbook of physiological research methods in health psychology, by Linda J. Luecken and Linda C. Gallo. www.sagepub.com/booksProdDesc.nav

Amy Kraft was awarded a prestigious American Heart Association Pre-Doctoral Fellowship for her dissertation project: "Childhood Family Conflict and Physical and Cognitive Responses to Interpersonal Interactions in Adults"