_{^{I teach and conduct research in the field of human development and family studies and developmental psychology. I study the processes through which parents help their children to develop positive social, emotional, and self-regulatory outcomes by examining "goodness of fit" between parenting behavior and child characteristics.}}

_{^{My research challenges the idea that parenting functions the same way across situations and across child temperament type. Specifically, I examine how parenting behaviors in different types of situations relate to child outcomes differently based on child temperament. Additionally, I am interested in how parents’ cognitions and physiological responses in different parenting situations predict individual patterns of parenting behavior. I consider such individual differences in parents and children at multiple levels of analysis, with a particular emphasis on behavioral observations and physiological measures (e.g., RSA, SCL).}}

_{^{I am currently a Visiting Assistant Professor of Psychology at Hamilton College. Prior to coming to Hamilton I completed a Carolina Consortium on Human Development postdoctoral fellowship (NICHD, T32-HD07376) at the Center for Developmental Science at UNC Chapel Hill, and conducted research at UNC Greensboro with my fellowship mentor Dr. Esther Leerkes. I received my B.S. and M.S. in Psychology with an emphasis in developmental psychology from Lehigh University, where I worked with Dr. Deborah Laible. I received my Ph.D. in Human Development and Family Studies from Pennsylvania State University under the mentorship of Dr. Cynthia Stifter.}}