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Family Research Scholars Program
FAMILY RESEARCH SCHOLARS 2003-2004
Daniel Anderson, Professor of Psychology (Developmental Area)
545-0269, anderson@psych.umass.edu
Dr. Anderson's general area of research is children and media, particularly television. He focuses on a cognitive analysis of children's television viewing, as well as the impact of television on cognitive development and education. Dr. Anderson's research has been funded by National Institute of Health, the National Science Foundation, as well as private foundations and industry. His current research is supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation and investigates the impact of television on 1- to 3-year-olds, including the effects of families' background television on infant and toddler behavior, and brain activation during television viewing.
Dr. Anderson frequently does research and consulting for children's educational television programs, such as Sesame Street, Captain Kangaroo, The Wubbulous World of Dr. Seuss, and Fimbles (BBC), as well as other electronic media. He helped to develop Allegra's Window, Gullah Gullah Island, Blue's Clues, Dora the Explorer, and Bear in the Big Blue House, among other programs. He serves widely as an advisor on applied research, strategic planning, and policy issues related to children's. He has received a NIH Research Scientist Development Award and served as principal investigator for a NIH training grant in Developmental Psychology.
David Arnold, Associate Professor of Psychology (Clinical Division)
545-2157, darnold@psych.umass.edu
Dr. Arnold's research evaluates community partnership programs designed to foster disadvantaged young children's preliteracy development and academic engagement, while reducing behavior problems and promoting positive relationships with parents and teachers. His programs include both parents and teachers because of evidence that multiple intervention points produce stronger effects. Dr. Arnold's research predicts that academic development will be improved by interventions that include a focus on both academic and behavior problems, preventing a negative cycle of academic problems leading to behavioral difficulties, which in turn cause increased learning problems. Dr. Arnold's research program has built collaborative networks among his research team, schools, and parents in primarily minority communities, thus findings from his program will have policy implications for these underserved populations. This research was chosen by the National Academy of Science's Board on Children, Youth and Families as one of 6 most likely to influence public policy in the 21st century. Dr. Arnold's research has been funded by the National Institute of Mental Health and he was awarded a highly competitive 5-year Young Scholars Faculty Fellowship from the William T. Grant Foundation. He was also selected as a recipient of the Frontiers Award for ground-breaking research by the National Research Council.
Daniel Clawson, Professor of Sociology
545-5974, clawson@sadri.umass.edu
Dr. Clawson's research focuses on labor movements and labor policy in the U.S., and their impact on the well-being of families. He organized a major conference in Washington on childcare and recently co-authored (with Dr. Gerstel) an article comparing U.S. child care policy to policies in Europe, published in Contexts, the award-winning journal of the American Sociological Association. Professor Clawson's research is very widely cited and well received outside academic circles, as well as having had an immense impact within his discipline. In 2002, Dr. Clawson (With Naomi Gerstel and Robert Zussman) published an edited volume Families at Work: Expanding the Bounds, which echoes another line of work clear in his journal publications - concern for working class and working poor. As with his numerous earlier publications and four other books, this book has had a tremendous reception, influencing scholars and public policy discussions. Dr. Clawson has served as editor of Contemporary Sociology, and as co-editor of the Rose Series in Sociology. He has received research funding from the National Science Foundation, the Foundation for Child Development, and was a Kellogg National Fellow.
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Naomi Gerstel, Professor of Sociology
545-5976, gerstel@sadri.umass.edu
Dr. Gerstel's research examines the structural factors that contribute to the gender gap in care work in families. She has studied the effects of employment on the gender gap in adult children's care to parents, the effects of marriage and marriage/work patterns on care to children and kin, the family and employment patterns that shape the care men provide to family and friends, the extent to which young children act both to constrain and strengthen kin ties, the characteristics of work and family that shape employees use of the Family Medical Leave Act, and a comparison of US childcare policy with that found in Europe. Dr. Gerstel has been a visiting scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation and her research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of Health, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the National Academy of Science. Drs. Gerstel and Clawson are examining how employees, along with their families and employers, make decisions about work hours and schedules, and the conditions under which these employees and their families embrace, negotiate and resist these hours, individually and collectively.
Paula Pietromonaco, Associate Professor of Psychology (Social and Personality Division)
545-3156, monaco@psych.umass.edu
Dr. Pietromonaco studies attachment styles in adulthood and the effects of attachment on dating and marital relationships. She is a leader in this field of study, consistently publishing in and serving on the editorial boards of the most highly regarding journals in social and personality psychology. She is known for her use of multiple methods of investigation, combining direct observation of dating and married couples, daily event sampling methods, survey, and laboratory experiments. She was recently awarded a Faculty Research Award from the University, as well as a Teachnology Fellowship for innovative use of technology in the classroom.
Erica Scharrer, Associate Professor of Communication
545-4765, scharrer@comm.umass.edu
Dr. Scharrer studies media effects on aggression and socialization, particularly the impact of television and videogames on gender role socialization, and the influence of media violence and hyper-masculinity on antisocial behavior. She has also examined the portrayal of fathers on TV. She has coauthored two books, Television: What's on, who's watching, and what it means, which was nominated for the International Communication Association Book Award, and Pointing the finger of blame: News media coverage of popular culture culpability. Her current work investigates how media violence influences children's opinions, decisions, and use of media throughout their adolescent years. She consults regularly to parent organizations and schools regarding the use of media with children and adolescents, and designs school and family intervention programs for use with adolescents. Dr. Scharrer was a Lilly Teaching Fellow, a Teagle Fellow (for community-service learning activities), and a recipient of the College's Outstanding Teaching Award. She has received two Faculty Research Grants, as well as numerous grants for her service learning activities.
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