Advancing Youth Mental Health through Research on Close Relationships
I am a Canadian Institutes of Health Research Health Systems Impact Postdoctoral Fellow at the Offord Centre for Child Studies at McMaster University and at Harvard University. I completed my PhD in Clinical Psychology at McGill University, with research and clinical specialization in youth and young adults.
Through the Health Systems Impact Fellowship, funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Institute for Population and Public Health, I translate research into practice in partnership with School Mental Health Ontario. In particular, our work is focused on improving the use of evidence-informed assessment and intervention in school mental health settings.
My research aims to answer: When do close relationships – particularly friendships – support youth mental health, and when do they undermine it?
I leverage a range of methods (e.g., longitudinal modelling, meta-analysis, machine learning, population-level data, consensus-building approaches), to build this evidence.
My long-term goal is to determine when youths’ close relationships become harmful and for whom these harms are most likely to emerge, then translate the evidence into applied practice. Through this work, I aim to inform interventions that are flexible, identity-affirming, and tailored to youth realities – ensuring that all young people can thrive in their close relationships and beyond.