Faculty
J. DAVID CRESWELL, PH.D.
Principal Investigator
William S. Dietrich II Professor in Psychology
Areas of Specialization: Health Psychology, Psychoneuroimmunology, Social Neuroscience, Positive Psychology, Social Cognition, Social Psychology, and Clinical Psychology
Interests: Self-regulation, stress and coping, mind-body relationships, behavioral interventions, meditation, research methods, the science of consciousness, and performance enhancement
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David’s research focuses broadly on understanding what makes people resilient under stress. Specifically, he conducts community intervention studies, laboratory studies of stress and coping, and neuroimaging studies to understand how various stress management strategies alter coping and stress resilience. For example, he is currently working on studies that test how mindfulness meditation training impacts the brain, peripheral stress physiological responses, and stress-related disease outcomes in at-risk community samples (click here for a mini-review paper of this work). Much of this recent work on mindfulness meditation training focuses on the important role of learning acceptance and equanimity skills for stress reduction and health. David also explores how the use of simple strategies (self-affirmation, rewarding activities, cognitive reappraisal) can buffer stress and improve problem-solving under pressure.
David has made some recent research forays into other areas, such as developing new experience sampling research on mental health and resilience among college students, describing the role of unconscious processes in learning and decision making, developing new theory and research on behavioral priming, and helping build a new field of health neuroscience.
David’s work has been published in general science, health psychology, social psychology, neuroscience, and medical journals. He was recognized in 2011 as a Rising Star by the Association for Psychological Science, and in 2014 received the American Psychological Association Early Career Award, and in 2017 he received the Herbert Weiner Early Career Award from the American Psychosomatic Society for his scientific contributions.
JANINE M. DUTCHER, PH.D.
Lab Director
Assistant Research Professor
Areas of Specialization: Social and Health Neuroscience, Social Psychology, Behavioral Interventions, Psycho-oncology
Interests: Janine’s research seeks to understand the neurobiological mechanisms of stress reduction interventions. She uses multiple methods, including functional and structural neuroimaging, psychoneuroimmunology, and ecological momentary assessment to explore how these processes have effects on physical health and well-being. She also conducts translational work that investigates the role these stress reduction interventions play in improving mental and physical health among clinical and at-risk groups, including patients with cancer, young adults at risk of depression, and lonely individuals.
Janine’s work has been published in neuroscience, social psychology, health psychology and psychoneuroimmunology journals. She has received grant funding from the National Cancer Institute (R01) and the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (L30 and K01). Janine has received the Young Investigator Colloquium Award and MacLean Scholar Award from the American Psychosomatic Society. Janine completed her PhD at UCLA in Social Psychology in 2016, and her BS in Psychology at Carnegie Mellon in 2010.
Janine is additionally the Co-Director of the CMU-Pitt BRIDGE Center, a state-of-the-art research-dedicated neuroimaging facility.
KIRK WARREN BROWN, PH.D.
Quantitative Psychologist
Special Faculty Researcher
Interests: Kirk Warren Brown is a faculty member in the Department of Psychology at Carnegie Mellon University and is affiliate faculty in Psychology at Virginia Commonwealth University. His research centers on the importance of awareness of internal states and behavior to healthy human functioning, with a particular interest in the nature of mindfulness and the value of mindfulness training to enhance emotion regulation, behavior regulation, and well-being.
He has authored numerous scholarly articles on these topics and published the Handbook of Mindfulness: Theory, Research, and Practice (2015) and the Oxford Handbook of Hypo-egoic Phenomena (2016). His work has been featured in a range of national and international media outlets. Dr. Brown is a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, the Society for Social and Personality Psychology, and the American Psychological Association. He also teaches the evidence-based Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction program.
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Post-Docs & Graduate Students
Yuval Hadash
Postdoctoral Fellow
University of Haifa '22, PhD in Clinical Psychology
Hometown: Sdot Yam, Israel
Areas of Specialization: Mindfulness Mechanisms, Mindfulness Interventions, Mental Health, Behavioral Assessment
Research Interests: My research is broadly focused on the psychological mechanisms of mindfulness, including attention, awareness, equanimity, and decentering. Through this work, I aim to gain insights into the malleable cognitive and affective processes that can improve mental and physical health, and to understand the ways people can develop these processes via mental training. To pursue these goals, I develop and use novel behavioral methods to measures and study mindfulness mechanisms and develop and empirically test models of the roles of cognitive and affective processes in mindfulness training and in mental health. Additionally, I study the effects of mindfulness interventions on mental and physical health outcomes in clinical and non-clinical populations.
Fun Fact: I love open water swimming.
Asal Yunusova
Graduate Student
University of California Irvine ‘18
Carnegie Mellon University ‘26 PhD in Social, Personality & Health Psychology
Hometown: Los Angeles, California
Research Interests: Broadly I am interested in mind-body interventions and protective biopsychosocial factors that aid in positive health outcomes in populations coping with chronic health conditions. More specifically, I am interested in the mind-gut connection and investigating interventions (i.e., mindfulness meditation) and factors (i.e., emotional validation) that can improve well-being in patients with gastrointestinal disorders such as Irritable Bowel Syndrome.
Fun Fact: I love going to immersive art museums, concerts, hammocking, and painting. When I'm back home in California, you can find me watching a sunset at the beach with some In-N-Out. Something that's next on my bucket list is seeing the northern lights!
Staff
Sarah Wu
Director of Research Operations
Carnegie Mellon University, B.S. in Biological Sciences and Psychology, 2021
Hometown: Newton, MA
Research Interests: Broadly, I am interested in the role integrated health care plays in improving health outcomes. I seek to understand how stress interventions can reduce disease symptoms. Further, I am interested in how socio-cultural factors impact attitudes towards healthcare and the adoption of positive health behaviors.
Fun Fact: In 2022, I hiked 2200 miles from Georgia to Maine!
Bethany Nicole Sanov
Project Manager
Carnegie Mellon University, B.S. in Psychology with a clinical concentration and minor in Gender Studies, 2022
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Hometown: Austin, TX
Research Interests: Broadly, I am interested in studying research questions among underserved communities, such as racial and ethnic minorities or gender and sexual minorities, in order to expand our understanding of health outcomes beyond populations traditionally used in research (e.g., White, upper/middle class, cis-gendered, educated participants). Particularly, I am interested in understanding the unique factors that contribute to health outcomes among certain social groups (e.g., minority stress, internal stigmatization, community social support), and the contexts in which certain strategies and interventions work best for specific communities.
Fun Fact: I have a poor sense of smell, so I can eat really spicy food!
Jordan Albert
Project Manager
University of Pittsburgh, B.S. in Information Systems, 2015
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Hometown: Pittsburgh, PA
Research Interests: My interest in understanding human resilience is in exploring how perspectives and beliefs are shaped, regulated, and alter our psychological, physiological, and behavioral experience. My research interest extends across the domains of health and social structures.
Fun Fact: I enjoy hiking with my dog, frequenting museums, listening to podcasts, and time spent with family and friends.
Solana Morningstar
Administrative Assistant & Communications Director
Carnegie Mellon University, B.S. in Neuroscience, 2021
University of Groningen/Ghent University/University of Eastern Finland, M.S. & M.A. in Clinical Linguistics, 2023
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Hometown: Pittsburgh, PA
Research Interests: neurodegenerative diseases, aphasias, and biological impacts of stress
Fun Fact: Over the 2 years I was working on my master's degree, I travelled to over 20 countries.
Rory Dutcher
Nickname: Lab Lab
Ruffgers University, Ph.D. in Environmental Studies, June 2020
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Research Interests: My one great passion is reducing people's stress through social interaction. I have donated my body via pets and stomach rubs, always for the good of science, countless times. While I focus mainly on relationships and connections, I can also be found researching Pavlovian conditioning, positive reinforcement in the form of blueberries, and the benefits that stem from a good nap in the sun.
Fun Fact: I am regularly dubbed the "most walked dog" in the neighborhood.
