Jodi Quas

Department:
Psychological Science

Specializations:
effects of trauma and maltreatment on children, memory development, children’s involvement in the legal system

THE BEST PLACE TO LEARN ABOUT WHAT WE DO:

Click here to learn about our new and ongoing projects, our exciting team, and how to get involved.

PROSPECTIVE GRADUATE STUDENTS

I may be taking a new student this coming year (2024-2025), please see our lab link above or samples of our work below to learn what we are doing now.

MY RESEARCH INTERESTS:

Memory development in early childhood, effects of stress and trauma on children’s development, and children’s involvement in the legal system. Specific interests include strategies to improve children’s narrative productivity and accuracy; the effects of stress on children’s memory; emotional regulation and physiological reactivity as predictors of children’s coping with and memory for stressful events; jurors’ perceptions of child witnesses; and consequences of legal involvement on child witnesses and victims.

SAMPLES OF OUR WORK AND COLLABORATIONS:

1. How do stress and development affect children’s and adolescents’ memory and reporting tendencies, and what specific interviewing techniques facilitate their reporting?

Collaborators: Rachel Dianiska, Ph.D., Emma Simpson, M.A.

2. What questioning tactics are effective at eliciting complete and accurate disclosures from youth victims of violence and how knowledgeable are law enforcement and first responders about these tactics?

Collaborators: Rachel Dianiska, Ph.D., Kaitlin Hardin, Ph.D., Emma Simpson, M.A., Sarah Kim, M.A., Corey Rood, M.D., Allison Redlich, Ph.D. (George Mason University)

3. How does exposure to chronic adversity affect children’s and adolescents’ coping, rumination, and memory, directly and in conjunction with acute stress?

Collaborators: Victoria Dykstra, Ph.D., Emma Simpson, M.A., Sarah Kim, M.A., Alyson Zalta, Ph.D., Gail Goodman, Ph.D. (UC Davis)

4. What are the links between maltreatment and children’s emotional competence, especially their ability to regulate their emotions and understand emotions in others, and how do these links change with development?

Collaborators: Helen Milojevich, Ph.D. (Oklahoma State University), Jennifer Skeem, Ph.D. (UC Berkeley), Kelli Dickerson, Ph.D. (UC Irvine), Stacy Metcalf, Ph.D. (Evalcorp, inc).