People

Brian M. D'Onofrio, Ph.D.

Principal Investigator | Professor

Email:

bmdonofr@iu.edu

Resume/CV

My research seeks to understand the etiology, assessment, and treatment of child and adolescent psychopathology using multiple designs, including quasi-experimental designs, longitudinal research, and intervention studies. My recent research has focused on using and combining several advanced epidemiologic approaches to better understand the consequences of perinatal risk factors, particularly medications during pregnancy, and the risks and benefits of psychiatric and pain medication for the individuals themselves. Furthermore, my research is focused on better understanding health disparities, particularly among vulnerable and marginalized groups of individuals. Most of my research consists of secondary data analysis of large datasets (e.g., national Swedish datasets, datasets of 30,000 twin pairs in Sweden, and health insurance claims datasets in the United States). I also conduct intervention and health services research, which is currently focused on how to best assess behavioral health problems in community settings, including primary care clinics, behavioral health clinics, emergency departments, educational institutions, and criminal justice settings.Google Scholar Citations    

Patrick D. Quinn, Ph.D.

Associate Professor, Department of Applied Health Science | Adjunct Appointment, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences

Email:

quinnp@iu.edu

Website   I study the causes and consequences of substance use. My research ranges across substances (e.g., from cigarette smoking to opioids) and across the lifespan (e.g., from prenatal drug exposure to medication treatment for ADHD in adults). Much of my current research examines pain and its management with opioid medications, using longitudinal data on individuals and families and methods from epidemiology and behavioral genetics. I am also interested in understanding the risks and benefits of other medications that have the potential for abuse (e.g., ADHD medications). From 2014 to 2018, I was a postdoctoral researcher in the Developmental Psychopathology Lab, and I am still an active collaborator with the lab. I received my doctorate in clinical psychology from The University of Texas at Austin and completed my APA-accredited pre-doctoral internship at the Indiana University School of Medicine. Note. I am available to serve as a primary advisor for doctoral students in the Clinical Science Program.  

Natasha Chaku, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences

Email:

nchaku@iu.edu

Website   Dr. Natasha Chaku, PhD (she/her) is a developmental psychologist in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Indiana University Bloomington. The overarching aim of her research is to understand “what works when and for whom,” by developing and using increasingly personalized methods to understand adolescent behavior. Specifically, Dr. Chaku's research examines the effect of pubertal development on cognition, health, and behavior. She uses intensive longitudinal assessments (e.g., daily diaries), physiological data collection (e.g., saliva), and behavioral assessments (e.g., neurocognitive testing) alongside secondary data analyses and community-oriented data collection (e.g., youth participatory action research) to better understand youth’s lived experiences.   

Tennisha Riley, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor, University of Florida

Email:

tennriley03@ufl.edu

Website   Dr. Riley is the principal investigator of the Black Youth Emotional Development and Identity in Group Contexts (BEInG) Research Lab. Her research examines emotional development and emotion regulation during adolescence, with particular attention to how social contexts such as families, peer relationships, and schools shape emotional processes. A central aim of her work is to understand how emotion regulation processes contribute to both adaptive outcomes (e.g., prosocial behavior) and health-related risk behaviors during adolescence. Dr. Riley’s research takes a developmental and ecological approach to adolescent well-being, integrating theory and methods from developmental psychology, prevention science, and family studies. Her work is informed by prior clinical experience working with families as a multisystemic therapist and by applied research partnerships that support intervention and prevention efforts aimed at promoting healthy adolescent development.  

Emma N. Cleary

Email:

encleary@iu.edu

Resume/CV

My current research projects focus on the use of prescribed opioid analgesics during pregnancy and postpartum. I am particularly interested in studying the potential impacts of these medications on both child development and postpartum mental health. My work utilizes large datasets and epidemiologic methods to help disentangle potential causal effects of opioid medications from effects of other factors that may be associated with both opioid analgesic use and risk of adverse outcomes, including genetic and environmental factors, and indication for prescription opioid use. My clinical interest is in reproductive psychology, particularly perinatal mental health conditions and infertility. Before joining the Developmental Psychopathology Lab in 2020, I received my BA in Psychology and Modern Foreign Language from Syracuse University and worked as a project coordinator at Penn State. 

Haneen Hammad

Email:

hahammad@iu.edu

Resume/CV

• LinkedIn

My research interests include examining sex differences in the development of substance use disorders, with a focus on the role of trauma in women's substance use and how these pathways vary by race, ethnicity, and other sociodemographic factors. Before joining the Developmental Psychopathology Lab, I earned my bachelor's degree in Chemistry from Michigan State University and my MSc in Neuroscience and Psychology of Mental Health from King's College London. I worked as a Research Assistant at Michigan State University, where I contributed to evaluating the efficacy of a postpartum depression prevention program, and I served as Substance Use and Addiction Branch Lead at the Muslim Mental Health and Islamic Psychology Lab at Stanford.

Kelsey Isman

Email:

kisman@iu.edu

Resume/CV

My research is focused on substance use disorder epidemiology. Specifically, I am interested in community level trends in substance use, the stigma associated with substance use disorders, and barriers to accessing medications for opioid use and harm reduction resources. Before coming to IU, I graduated with a BA in psychology, neuroscience & behavior, and Spanish from Wesleyan University in 2023 and worked at the National Institute on Drug Abuse as a postbac researcher in the Technology and Translational Research Unit.  

Austin Medlin

Email:

aumedlin@iu.edu

Resume/CV

I am pursuing a PhD in Health Behavior in the School of Public Health at Indiana University Bloomington. My research focuses on understanding pathways linking psychiatric conditions, psychoactive medication use, and cardiometabolic health across the life course. Currently, I am particularly interested in clarifying how stimulant medication use intersects with cardiometabolic risk among adults with ADHD. My work leverages large-scale healthcare data and epidemiologic methods to identify real-world cardiometabolic effects of psychoactive medications. Prior to joining the Developmental Psychopathology Lab, I earned bachelor’s degrees in psychology and mathematics from Oklahoma State University (2021) and an MS in biostatistics from Indiana University (2024). 

Richard F. Meraz

Research Data Engineering Lead

Email:

rfmeraz@iu.edu

• LinkedIn

I have held a range of technical, leadership, and consulting roles in the public and private sectors. I currently lead the data engineering efforts in the lab using large observational health data sets. I also consult with the Office of the Vice Provost to support campus-wide projects related to research data in the health sciences.

Martin E. Rickert, Ph.D.

Research and Data Scientist

Email:

rickertm@iu.edu

Website:

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Martin_Rickert

I specialize in computational work and bring extensive expertise in scientific research and high-performance computing to the lab. My primary responsibility involves developing software to extract and integrate information from large population registries and observational health datasets. I also mentor graduate students on data visualization, statistical estimation, and modeling using SAS, Stata, and R.Google Scholar Citations

Hailemichael B. Shone, Ph.D.

Data Scientist

Phone:

(+18) 285-2507

Email:

hashone@iu.edu

Resume/CV

• LinkedIn

My background is in health economics and applied econometrics, with extensive experience analyzing large administrative and observational health datasets. My responsibilities include designing data analysis pipelines to process health claims data and implementing analytical and statistical methods that supports the research activities of the lab. I also mentor graduate students in working with large claims databases and applying causal inference methods.