DECEMBER 13, 2024
Northeastern University
About the Presentation: Adolescence is marked by tremendous social, psychological, and neurobiological maturation. Changes in social cognition, motivational, and affective processes contribute to new social roles, relationships, and an intense preoccupation with peer approval. At the same time, adolescence is a period of peak risk for the emergence of psychopathology, particularly depression and anxiety. I employ experimental (i.e., task-based), neuroimaging, and observational (i.e., digital phenotyping of real-world behavior) approaches to examine the psychological and neurobiological pathways that link social experiences during adolescence with the emergence of psychopathology.
In this talk, I examine how adolescents process social experiences in ways that are distinct from children and adults, determine whether these aspects of social processing influence risk for mental health problems, and evaluate how social factors can be leveraged to promote resilience in the face of stress during this developmental period. I will also share some upcoming work, where we incorporate advanced machine learning approaches to characterize digital measures of real-world social behavior with the eventual goal of predicting states of psychological risk. Understanding the underlying social and neurobiological mechanisms that give rise to adolescent psychopathology will help identify malleable targets for intervention.
About the Presenter:
Dr. Rodman is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology and Center for Cognitive and Brain Health at Northeastern University. She completed her PhD in Clinical Psychology at Harvard University, where she also completed her postdoctoral fellowship. She completed her clinical internship at the Boston VA and earned her BA in Clinical Psychology at Tufts University.
As a licensed Clinical Psychologist, her interdisciplinary research bridges developmental cognitive neuroscience and clinical science. Her work centers on the social worlds of teens, examining how social experiences interact with ongoing cognitive and brain development to increase risk for mental health problems during adolescence, a period of heightened vulnerability. This work lays the foundation for future translational clinical research, ultimately aimed at improving the wellbeing of adolescents. Her research has been funded by foundation and federal grants, including the John Templeton Foundation, American Psychological Foundation, and National Institute of Mental Health.