Multi-method Temperament Assessment Battery Across the Lifespan

The DREaM Lab is working on to developing a battery of theoretically and empirically grounded measures of temperament/personality across the lifespan to increase understanding of how temperament/ personality contributes to the development of psychopathology. Existing parent-report measures of child temperament may not be providing the information they were intended to provide as indicated in Dr. Kotelnikova’s past publications. Further, additional statistically rigorous research is needed to understand the nature and structure of observed child temperament. As a result, the DREaM Lab is working on filling this gap in the extant literature.

Stay-at-home Order: Dark Clouds or Also Silver Linings?

This is a study of impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health. The DREaM Lab collaborated with the Crescent City Substance Use Lab to collect data on adaptive and maladaptive personality traits, internalizing, and externalizing symptoms from participants living in the states that were the most affected by the pandemic as of April, 2020. Some of the questions that we are trying to answer include the following:

1. How does the stay-at-home order and its removal affect patterns of depressive and anxious symptoms? How do OCD symptoms (i.e., obsessions and compulsions related to cleanliness and safety) change as a result of being confined to one’s home and after the restrictions are lifted?

2. How do maladaptive personality traits (e.g., disinhibition, sensation seeking, detachment) impact coping styles and mental health during this stressful time? How do the specific traits impact changes in depressive, anxious, OCD, and substance use symptoms and their comorbidity?

3. Are parents, especially those taking care of more than one child, particularly at risk for experiencing an increase in mental health difficulties during the stay-at-home order?