Using Dyadic Intensive Longitudinal Methods to Study Everyday Health-Related Processes

The use of Intensive Longitudinal Methods (ILMs) has grown exponentially in the behavioral, social, and biomedical sciences over the past 30 years. This class of research paradigms is used to study everyday psychological experience in its natural context (a.k.a "studying life as it is lived"). In this talk, J-P Laurenceau will review some of the work he has done using ILMs to study how certain dyadic processes unfold in everyday life. He will draw primarily from two distinct but related lines of work reflecting how patient-partner couples cope with breast cancer and with type 2 diabetes. He will conclude by touching on future directions that will attempt to capitalize upon some of the unique methodological expertise of Michigan's ISR researchers. 

Jean-Philippe Laurenceau, Ph.D. (B.A. 1992 Cornell; Ph.D. 1999 Penn State) is the Unidel A. Gilchrist Sparks III Chair in the Social Sciences and Professor of Psychological & Brain Sciences at the University of Delaware where he teaches courses on methodology and applied data analysis as well as intimate relationships. J-P uses Intensive Longitudinal Methods to study individual and dyadic processes related to intimacy and health. He is an elected member of the Society of Multivariate Experimental Psychology and fellow of the Association for Psychological Science. J-P is co-author with Niall Bolger of the book Intensive Longitudinal Methods: An Introduction to Diary and Experience Sampling Research (Guilford Press). For further details, please see his academic web page.

Richard Gonzalez hosts.

Throughout its history, autism has been conceptualized as a mostly male condition. Although gender/sex differences in autism diagnosis are shrinking, public recognition of this shift may be lagging for various reasons. For example, even today, the rare media depictions of autistic adults (many are of autistic children and adolescents, usually boys) disproportionately focus on autistic men. Insofar as these depictions inform societal impressions, a masculinization hypothesis suggests that both autistic men and autistic women may be construed as having more masculine qualities than their non-autistic counterparts. In this talk, Andrew Todd will report findings from a new and ongoing line of research that are better accommodated by an alternative de-gendering hypothesis: In multiple experiments using a combination of direct and indirect methodological approaches, autistic adults were construed as having fewer gender-consistent traits than neurotypical and neurotype-unspecified adults. Furthermore, this de-gendering pattern had downstream implications that align with dehumanizing experiences commonly reported by autistic adults—that they’re viewed by others both as machine-like (i.e., mechanistic dehumanization) and as more childlike (i.e., infantilization) than their chronological age dictates. These mechanized and infantilized impressions of autistic women and men, which were not fully reducible to general negativity toward autism specifically or toward neurodivergence or disability more broadly, were evident (albeit more weakly) even among autistic participants.

Andrew Todd (BA, Michigan State; MS & PhD, Northwestern) is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Davis. Much of his research falls into two general themes: (1) antecedents and consequences of perspective taking and mental-state reasoning, and (2) mental representations of people with different combinations of social identities.

Allison Earl hosts.

Racial discrimination continues to have profound and lasting effects on the mental health of Black individuals. Perseverative coping or the chronic and continuous contemplation about symptoms, causes, and consequences of distress represents an important, yet under-explored mechanism that may explain and exacerbate the deleterious consequences of racial discrimination. Drawing from recent and forthcoming work from Dr. Bernard, this presentation will highlight how perseverative coping can influence the discrimination-mental health link among Black youth and emerging adults. Additionally, this presentation will discuss the value of considering perseverative coping as a culturally relevant, malleable intervention target that can reduce negative mental health sequalae in the aftermath of racism-related experiences.

Dr. Donte Bernard’s program of research examines the direct and indirect pathways by which racism compromises the mental and behavioral health and well-being of Black children, adolescents, and emerging adults. Anchored by cultural ecological models recognizing the importance of risk and resilience at the individual and contextual level, his research leverages both quantitative and qualitative methods to identify how Black youth identify, cope with, and navigate racism-related experiences across sensitive developmental periods. Ultimately, the goal of his research is to eliminate racial disparities in mental and behavioral health through informing policy and intervention development targeting the reduction of racism and its related health consequences.

Myles Durkee hosts.

Dr. Bill Chopik (he/his/him) joins us at the University of Michigan March 31, 3025, for a talk co-sponsored by the Research Center for Group Dynamics and the Katz-Newcomb Colloquium Series: "Optimism and health: Resource or delusion?"

Does it always help to look on the bright side of life and a situation? Years of individual difference and lifespan development research have framed optimism—the tendency to expect positive things in the future—as an asset that protects against physical and cognitive decline. There is also an assumption that optimism is a purely individual resource, originating from people alone, irrespective of their environments. In this talk, Chopik will revisit these approaches and provide some evidence that people are optimistic even when they shouldn’t be, how the optimism of other people affects us, and how where you live might alter how you think about the future. The goal of this session is to give you a crash course on optimism and where it comes from—topics that expand our understanding of health and resilience and should be of interest to everyone, even if you’re a pessimist at heart.

Dr. Chopik is an associate professor in the Department of Psychology at Michigan State University. He studies how close relationships—and the people in them—change over time and across situations. Dr. Chopik’s work examines phenomena as broad as how relationships and social institutions shape development and as focused as the mechanisms that underlie the link between close relationships and health. In 2017, Dr. Chopik was recognized as one of Forbes Magazine’s Top 30 Scientists Under 30 and has since been recognized as a Rising Star by the Association for Psychological Science.

David Dunning, organizer of the Katz-Newcomb speaker series in Psychology and an associate of the Research Center for Group Dynamics, hosts. RCGD's winter 2025 seminar series covers a variety of topics in social science, including social cognition, structural racism, romantic relationships, and cognitive health. Check the schedule for updates to this series that will convene on select Mondays at 3:30 at the Institute for Social Research, Room 1430.

As permissions allow, seminars are later posted to the RCGD YouTube playlist.

The M.O.S.A.I.C. of Multimorbidity: Measurement, Patterns, and Disparities Among Black Americans in the National Survey of American Life

Multimorbidity—the co-occurrence of two or more chronic conditions—represents a major contributor to racial health disparities in the United States. Yet, research on multimorbidity among Black Americans remains limited and inconsistent, particularly with regard to measurement approaches, inclusion of mental health conditions, and age-specific patterns. This gap undermines our ability to accurately estimate burden, identify at-risk groups, and design effective, culturally relevant interventions.

In this talk, Dr. Courtney S. Thomas Tobin will present emerging work from the M.O.S.A.I.C. (Multimorbidity Outcomes & Solutions for African/Black Americans In California) Initiative, a community-engaged research collaborative aimed at advancing equity-centered multimorbidity research and solutions. Focusing on Phase II of the Initiative—P.R².I.S.M. (Pinpointing Risks and Resources and Identifying Specific Multimorbidities)—this presentation draws on data from the National Survey of American Life (NSAL) to examine national patterns of multimorbidity among Black Americans.

Dr. Thomas Tobin will explore how definitions and measurement strategies (e.g., counts vs. categories, inclusion of mental health conditions) shape estimates of prevalence, associated correlates, and subgroup differences across the adult life course. Findings offer critical insights for improving the measurement, monitoring, and mitigation of multimorbidity in Black communities.

DeAnnah Byrd will present "Risk Factors, Protective Pathways, and Lifespan Perspectives of Cognition in Black Americans," discussing health disparities research across the life course, making between-group and within-group comparisons, and charting the effects of risk and protective factors on memory and cognitive changes in older Black/African Americans. 

Dr. DeAnnah Byrd is an Assistant Professor at Arizona State University (ASU) in Edson College of Nursing and Health Innovation. And is a Faculty Affiliate of the Center for Innovation and Healthy and Resilient Aging (CHIRA) at ASU and an Associate at the Michigan Center for Urban African American Aging Research at the University of Michigan. Dr. Byrd received her PhD in Community Health Sciences from UCLA’s Fielding School of Public Health in 2017. Her early work formed the basis of her current research program, which examines the effects of risk (chronic conditions, biological and psychosocial stressors) and protective (coping and social support) factors on memory and cognitive changes in older African Americans. Dr. Byrd is committed to help improve cognitive outcomes. Her work has been funded by the National Institute on Aging, the Alzheimer's Association, and the Michigan Alzheimer's Disease Center. She has received multiple awards, and her work is recognized both nationally and internationally. 

Briana Mezuk hosts.

Dr. Mark Brandt, Associate Professor of Psychology at Michigan State University, joins us at the University of Michigan April 21, 2025, for a talk co-sponsored by the Research Center for Group Dynamics and the Katz-Newcomb Colloquium Series.

The scientific study of attitudes typically treats attitudes individualistically. There are individual attitudes (e.g., preference for burritos) that vary in strength (e.g., central to the self), resistance to change (e.g., unwavering in the face of dietary information), and their relationship with relevant behaviors (e.g., purchasing of burritos). This approach misses a key property of attitudes: Attitudes are interdependent.

In this talk, Brandt focuses on recent research from my lab that studies how attitudes are dependent on other attitudes, identities, and values within a political belief system. He presents the findings that (1) central attitudes of a political belief systems are stronger, being more stable overtime and more resistant to change and (2) that attitudes become moralized when they are connected with other moralized attitudes in the belief system. In combination, these findings suggest that the interdependence of attitudes matters for attitude change and moralization.

The goal of Mark Brandt's research is to understand the causes and consequences of political, religious, and moral beliefs that can ultimately be leveraged to reduce conflict and promote a more fair, just, and free society. He studies ideological and moral beliefs – such as political ideology, racism, religious fundamentalism, and moral conviction – and how they structure attitudes and behaviors, how they become moralized, and why people adopt them in the first place.

David Dunning, organizer of the Katz-Newcomb speaker series in Psychology and an associate of the Research Center for Group Dynamics, hosts. RCGD's winter 2025 seminar series covers a variety of topics in social science, including social cognition, structural racism, romantic relationships, and cognitive health. Check the schedule for updates to this series that will convene on select Mondays at 3:30 at the Institute for Social Research, Room 1430, and for listings to resume this fall.

As permissions allow, seminars are later posted to the RCGD YouTube playlist.