Principal Investigators
Leslie Leve, Ph.D.
University of Oregon
Dr. Leslie Leve received her doctoral degree in Developmental Psychology from the University of Oregon in 1995. She is currently a Professor in Counseling Psychology and Human Services in the College of Education at the University of Oregon. Her research interests are in the area of child development, with a focus on understanding how families can best promote the healthy adjustment of children and adolescents. Her research includes preventive intervention research with youth in foster care and adolescents in the juvenile justice system, as well as studies of twins, adoptive families, and birth families. She has served as an investigator on over a dozen research grants funded by the NIH.
Jenae Neiderhiser, Ph.D.
Penn State University
Dr. Neiderhiser received her Ph.D. in Human Development and Family Studies at Penns State University where she is currently a Professor of Psychology. She is involved in studies looking at twins, siblings, and adoptees to understand how children and families influence each other. The Nonshared Environment in Adolescent Development project, the Young Adult Sibling Study, the Twin/Offspring Study in Sweden, and the Early Growth and Development Study have been able to answer some of these questions. They include extensive assessment of the environment within the household, interpersonal relationships, adult and child adjustment, and temperament and personality measures.
Jody Ganiban, Ph.D.
George Washington University
Dr. Ganiban’s research examines the impact of family and child characteristics on development. She has conducted research within a variety of populations, including adoptive families, stepfamilies, twins, premature infants, toddlers with Down syndrome, maltreated children, and toddlers with feeding disorders. Dr. Ganiban has also been involved in studies that examine environmental and genetic contributions to personality and family relationships. Her current projects explore the influence of families’ emotional climates on children’s emergent personalities and adjustment, the impact of children on parents, and risk factors for feeding problems and obesity.
David Reiss, Ph.D.
Yale University Child Study Center
Dr. Reiss received his medical training and specialty training in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Reiss is now on the faculty of the Yale Child Study Center and works as a consultant to the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Reiss’ research centers on understanding the relationships between genetic and social influences on the development of toddlers, adolescents, and adults. He is now working with an international team of researchers to develop programs for helping adopting families based on his research, and those of others, on the role of genetic factors and of parenting in promoting healthy child development.
Collaborating Investigators
Brendan Bohannan
University of Oregon
Brendan is a collaborating investigator with the microbial analysis team.
Cecilia (Chang) Liu, Ph.D.
Washington State University
Cecilia works as a collaborating investigator on the EGDS-ECHO project.
Dave DeGarmo
University of Oregon
Dave is a collaborating investigator with the methodology team.
Dawn Witherspoon, Ph.D.
Penn State University
Dr. Witherspoon is interested in how context shapes adolescent development. Her work focuses on the neighborhood, school, and family factors that affect adolescents’ socioemotional and academic adjustment. In addition, she examines how race, ethnicity, and other cultural attributes interact with contextual characteristics to influence adolescent outcomes. Her current work examines adolescent development from middle to high school to understand how aspects of the residential neighborhood, school, and family contexts are related to adolescents’ academic adjustment and beliefs as well as their deviant behaviors. A goal of her research is to elucidate the development of urban and rural adolescents, with particular attention to contextual supports.
Elizabeth Shirtcliff, Ph.D.
University of Oregon
Elizabeth works as a collaborating investigator on the EGDS-ECHO project.
Diane Mitchell
Penn State University
Diane is a collaborating investigator with the Penn State Diet Assessment Center.
Hannah Tavalire, Ph.D.
University of Oregon
Hannah is a collaborating investigator with the microbial analysis team.
Kristine Marceau, Ph.D.
Purdue University
Kristine works as a collaborating investigator with the EGDS-ECHO partner project.
Lorah Dorn, Ph.D.
PENN STATE University
Lorah Dorn is a collaborating investigator on the EGDS Adolescents project.
Lue Williams
University of Oregon
Lue is a graduate student researcher working on multiple facets of the EGDS.
Sam Simmens, Ph.D.
George Washington University
Dr. Simmens collaborates with colleagues in all of the health-related fields, applying his skills to research on HIV, cancer, obesity, mental health, maternal and infant development, chemical and stress-related environmental exposures, and numerous other health issues. Sam is the director of the Biostatistics and Epidemiology Consulting Service (BECS), which is a biostatistical consulting service that provides support to all faculty at The George Washington University
Sy-Miin Chow, Ph.D.
Penn State University
Dr. Chow is a quantitative psychologist with expertise in (1) dynamic modeling, particularly methodologies for handling intensive longitudinal data typically encountered in the social and behavioral sciences (e.g., noisy multivariate data from multiple participants with relatively short time lengths; (2) technical and methodological issues that arise in studies of change and human dynamics; and (3) models and approaches for representing the dynamics of emotions, child development and family processes, as well as ways of promoting well-being and risk prevention. Dr. Chow was elected to be a fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in Germany in 2005 and a member of the Society of Multivariate Experimental Psychology (SMEP) in 2012. She is a winner of the Cattell Award from SMEP as well as the Early Career Award from the Psychometric Society. She also served as Associated Editor (2013-2016) and Co-Editor of two special issues on Bayesian data analysis for Psychological Methods; and Associate Editor for Psychometrika (2011-2017).
Yosef Bodovski
Penn State University
Yosef is the GIS Specialist at Penn State with the EDGS.
Veronica Oro, Ph.D.
University of Oregon
Veronica Oro is a postdoctoral scholar working on multiple facets of the EGDS.
Diana Jenkins, Ph.D.
University of Oregon
Diana Jenkins is a postdoctoral scholar working on multiple facets of the EGDS.