Mansoo Yu, PhD
Director
Dr. Yu is a professor at the University of Missouri in the School of Social Work and Department of Public Health. Dr. Yu’s research interests include health-risk behaviors (e.g., tobacco and other substance use problems, physical inactivity); interactions between mental health and physical health; epidemiologic research; health promotion; adolescent health; health disparities; research with racial/ethnic minority Groups, and vulnerable/underserved populations; and cross-national research.
Dr. Yu received a BA from Sungkyunkwan University in 1998, a MA from Yonsei University in 2000, a MSW from Washington University in 2001, and a PhD from Washington University in 2006.
Duane Rudy, PhD
Associate Director
Dr. Rudy is an associate professor at the University of Missouri in the Department of Human Development and Family Science. Dr. Rudy’s research interests include socialization processes, parent-child relationships, culture and the family, and parental cognition.
Dr. Rudy received a BA in psychology from the University of Waterloo in 1986, a MA in psychology from the University of Toronto in 1995, and a PhD in psychology from the University of Toronto in 2000.
Gustavo Carlo, PhD
Founding Director
Dr. Carlo’s primary research interests include prosocial and moral development among children and adolescents, correlates associated with such development and positive health and adjustment among Latino families and youth.
Dr. Carlo received a BA in psychology from Florida International University in 1986, a MA in developmental psychology from Arizona State University in 1991, and a PhD in developmental psychology from Arizona State University in 1994. Dr. Carlo has recently co-edited books on prosocial development and rural ethnic minority youth and families in the United States.
Jean Ispa, PhD
Former Co-Director
Dr. Ispa is a professor emerita at the University of Missouri in the Department of Human Development and Family Science. Dr. Ispa’s research interests include the determinants of parent-child interaction quality, including economic stress, culture, parental mental health, child-rearing values and behaviors, and child characteristics.
Dr. Ispa received a BA in social relations from Cornell University in 1969 and a PhD in human development and family science from Cornell University in 1976. Recently Dr. Ispa and two of her colleagues were awarded an NIH grant to study the implications of early risk, parenting, and child self-regulation for middle childhood parent-child discourse styles.