The Center for Research on Families is excited to announce the new class of CRF Student Award recipients. The Student Awards Program is now in its fourth year and is continuing to support student research, training, and conference travel. This year, $39,200 in funding was awarded to eleven exceptional undergraduate and graduate students with an interest in researching issues related to the family. The program provides opportunities for students to work with UMass faculty on research projects and acknowledges outstanding student research on family issues. Awardees engage with the Center by attending two roundtable events to present their research.
The CRF Family Research Graduate Student Fellowship provided $10,000 to each of the following students for one year in order to work with a faculty member on a family research project:
Alix Olson, Ph.D. candidate in Political Science
“Queer (y)ing Permanent Partnership: Rethinking Kinship”
Claudia Lugo, Ph.D. candidate in Psychology
“Culture and the Emotion Socialization of Preschoolers”
Samantha Bernecker, Ph.D. candidate in Psychology
“Patient Interpersonal and Cognitive Changes and Their Relation to Outcome in Interpersonal Psychotherapy for Depression”
The CRF Family Research Travel Award is given to graduate students who have written an outstanding paper on issues of family research and will be presenting the paper at a national research conference. The award is used for travel expenses associated with the conference. This year’s winners were:
Milena Marchesi, Ph.D. candidate in Anthropology
“Reproducing Italians, Remaking the Social: Biopolitics and Social Cohesion in Neoliberal Times”
2012 Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, San Francisco, California
Holly Grant-Marsney, Ph.D. candidate in Clinical Psychology
“Adolescents’ Attachment to Adoptive Parents: Predicting Attachment Styles in Emerging Adulthood”
Society for Research and Development, Tampa, Florida
Rosanna Breaux, Ph.D. candidate in Clinical Psychology
“The Role of Parent Psychopathology in the Developmental Trajectories of Preschool Children with Behavior Problems”
Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies, National Harbor, Maryland
Hillary Hadley, Master’s candidate in Psychology
“Early Infant Experience Influences Perceptual Processing in Childhood”
Society for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting, Seattle Washington
The CRF Family Research Undergraduate Assistantship enables an undergraduate to work with a faculty member on a family research project through a grant of $3,000. Two assistantship grants were given to:
Maggie Cunningham, (class of 2013) Psychology
“Children Adopted by Lesbian, Gay, and Heterosexual Parents: How Peer Relationships Influence Children's Feelings of Self-worth”
Chantal Newkirk, (class of 2014) Sociology
“The Entrepreneurship of Motherhood: How Women’s Family Responsibility Shape and Are Shaped by their Paid Work”
The CRF Family Research Honors Thesis/Capstone Project Awardprovides awards to outstanding UMass senior undergraduate students whose honors thesis focuses on family issues. This year’s award was given to:
Michelle Hien, (class of 2013) Public Health, Economics, Psychology
"A Little Goes a Long Way: The Effects of Workplace Policies on the Mental Health of Low-Income, Working Mothers During the Transition to Parenthood."
The CRF Family Research Methodological Studies Grant allows a student or post-doctoral fellow to participate in the CRF summer Methodology Program for no fee and receive $500 travel reimbursement. This grant was awarded to:
Jinni Su, Ph.D. candidate, Human Development and Family Studies
University of North Carolina – Greensboro
The number of applicants for this year’s CRF Student Awards program made the program very competitive, and the variety of disciplines and topics selected in this cohort demonstrates the versatility and importance of family research. We are looking forward to supporting them throughout the next year!