Description of the Training Program
The program provides systematic research training
for candidates who want to develop expertise in research on childhood
and adolescence
and investigate variations in race and ethnicity, gender, and social
class and how these interact with risk and resiliency factors in
human development. One of the program’s goals is to identify
and develop scholars from underrepresented groups who will launch
independent research careers through external funding.
The postdoctoral program has three
themes:
- Increased knowledge of health disparities (such as depression,
positive well-being, behavioral or social adjustment) and possible
routes of redress that can be identified through developmental
research, with implications for education, behavioral interventions,
and health care policy.
- Expansion of the policy-relevant knowledge about childhood and
adolescence, which is often the target of local, state, or federal
interventions designed for "at-risk" children and youth.
Many well-intentioned interventions are characterized by a white,
middle-class perspective that often views normative variations
in development as deficient, if not deviant. A culturally informed
research program carried out by trained researchers from the same
underrepresented groups can inform policy makers about variability
in developmental trajectories and outcomes as well as about developmental
goals that are consistent with the communities' goals.
- Exploration of the importance of the external validity of research
results. Although the scientific enterprise pays careful attention
to issues of internal validity in the conduct of research, less
care is exercised when results of carefully planned and executed
studies are generalized to populations other than those that
have been studied. Recognizing appropriate limits and designing
research
that enhances generalizability will increase confidence in what
we know, about whom we know it, and under what conditions it
will
hold true.
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