Psychology > Graduate Programs > Developmental
Developmental
Graduate training in developmental psychology at the University of Hawaii is based on a mentorship model in which students develop research skills through close collaboration with faculty on research of mutual interest. Prospective applicants should carefully evaluate the match between their interests and those of the faculty.
Students are expected to engage in faculty-supervised research from their first year at UH, and to take increasing responsibility for charting the direction of that research as they progress through the program. Although each student will have one primary advisor, students are encouraged to gain additional research experience with other faculty in the concentration to gain familiarity with a variety of research methods and lines of inquiry.
Core Faculty
- Dr. Ashley Maynard, Assistant Professor
- Dr. Catherine Sophian, Professor
- Dr. Yiyuan Xu, Assistant Professor
Affiliated Faculty in Other Areas of Psychology
- Dr. Bruce Chorpita, Associate Professor
- Dr. Debra Lieberman, Assistant Professor
Cooperating Graduate Faculty
- Dr. Ann Peters, Professor (Linguistics)
- Dr. Mary Martini, Associate Professor (Human Resources)
- Dr. Barbara DeBaryshe, Associate Specialist (Center on the Family)
Research Facilities
The Developmental concentration relies primarily on Departmental research facilities. These include, among others, access to the usual ensemble of personal computers (including access to the University mainframe facilities), printers, copiers, scanners, faculty laboratory space, and extensive library facilities.
Research Interests of Core Faculty
Dr. Maynard studies the interrelationships of culture, the contexts of child development, and the healthy cognitive and social development of children. She conducts studies in Hawaii and at her international field site, Nabenchauk, a Zinacantec Maya hamlet located in the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico.Ý The domains of her research cover: (1) the developmental trajectory of children's teaching abilities; (2) the interacting roles of culture and cognitive tools (e.g., books, media, or weaving tools) in the development of thinking; (3) the impact of historical change and changing cultural models on child socialization; and the (4) the role of siblings in cognitive and social development.
Dr. Sophian's research interests focus on early cognitive development, particularly on understanding the developmental relations between earlier and later forms of knowledge. She is particularly interested in how children's understanding of mathematical concepts develops, both through informal (i.e., outside of school) activities and interactions and through school instruction.Ý Current research projects address children's and adults' understanding of fraction magnitudes, and the processes by which children and adults compare large numerical quantities.
Dr. Xu is investigating children's social development with a particular interest in culture. He is especially interested in applying a goodness of fit model to examine how the culture/biology interface shapes human development. The goodness of fit model proposes that children's developmental outcomes are largely contingent upon whether their individual attributes fit the contextual demands or norms set up by the local sociocultural conditions. Recently, Dr. Xu has applied the goodness of fit framework to study shyness in Chinese children. Dr. Xu's other research interests include violence in school peer groups (aggression and peer victimization), and children's peer relationships in varying cultural contexts.
Concentration Specifics
In addition to their research endeavors, students are expected to pursue an individualized program of study, through course work, directed readings, and other professional avenues that provide a broad foundation for the developmental inquiry reflected in their research. These individualized programs of study, to be planned in consultation with the faculty advisor and concentration faculty, should combine course work within developmental psychology with courses in other sub-disciplines (e.g., cognitive or social psychology) and disciplines (e.g., linguistics or education) that are related to the student's principal research interests.
Courses Required of the Developmental Degree Candidate
In addition to the departmental course requirements, masters level students concentrating in developmental psychology are expected to complete the following courses:
- Psy 640 Foundations of Developmental Psychology (also counts as a core departmental course)
- Psy 642 Cognitive Development
- Psy 741 Seminar in Developmental Psychology (may be taken more than once)
- Psy 749 Research in Developmental Psychology (students are expected to enroll in research hours during each semester throughout their graduate education)
Candidates for the Ph.D. degree with a developmental concentration will normally conduct their dissertation under the supervision of one of the developmental faculty, who will chair their dissertation committee. They are expected to complete at least one additional course or seminar in developmental psychology, at least one course in another area of psychology that relates to their developmental interests, and to enroll in research hours throughout their graduate studies.
