Ongoing Projects
Assessing survivor-centered scholarship programs
The REACH lab is collaborating with Freely in Hope, our community partner, on the Empowering Voices research project. FIH provides strategic support for young women affected by sexual violence in under-resourced communities in Zambia and Kenya. We are partnering on a study to assess the lessons learned from FIH’s survivor-centered scholarship program.
Amplifying voices that experienced anti-Asian racism during COVID
We collected qualitative and quantitative data from over 200 Asian-identified participants about their experiences of anti-Asian racism during COVID. We are conducting content analyses of participants' written narratives about their observations of racism and the resulting psychological impact. This project was funded by the USF Faculty Development Fund.
Developing anti-bias anti-racist (ABAR) Psych 101 open educational resources (OER)
Dr. Yang (Project PI/Team Lead), Dr. Aline Hitti, Dr. Lily Ma, and Dr. Zachary Reese received a $40,000 award to create ABAR OER for intro psych courses. The project will examine how lessons commonly taught in intro psych can change when we consider a range of diverse experiences and the hidden stories of theories, researchers, and cultures that are traditionally untold. This project is funded by the U.S. Department of Education's OER for Social Justice initiative.
Examining labor-based grading contracts in psychology classes as ABAR educational assessments
In collaboration with Drs. J. Garrett-Walker and Ben Levy at USF and Dr. Matt Capriotti at SJSU, this project aims to assess the implementation of grading contracts (GCs) across a range of psychology classes. We are looking at constructs of acceptability and feasibility, as well as whether GCs are more equitable as assessment tools for first-generation and other underrepresented university students in order to contribute to ABAR efforts in the college classroom.
Experiences of BIPOC gender expansive emerging adults
With lead researcher Dr. J. Garrett-Walker, this study centers gender expansive emerging adults of color to better understand experiences of intersectionality, mental health, and parental support.
Selected Completed Projects
Exploring unfair treatment experienced by Black, Indigenous, Women of Color (BIWOC) during most recent healthcare visits
Co-investigators, Dr. Karie Gaska, Dr. Shelby Scott, and Dr. Yang were one of four nationwide research teams selected as the 2020 Health Equity Research Awardees of the American Association of Medical Colleges' (AAMC's) Collaborative for Health Equity: Act, Research, Generate Evidence (CHARGE). This project centers women's experiences using an intersectional feminist approach, to examine questions of healthcare equity and access for BIWOC.
Distress reduction intervention for MSM recently diagnosed with HIV
We started with qualitative analysis and input from community advisory board members from Beijing Ditan Hospital to understand the problem from the perspective of stakeholders, the patients, their family members, caregivers, and health care providers. This conceptualization was then integrated with consultation from experts on HIV-related behavioral health and Chinese cultural concepts of psychological counseling, as well as existing literature on distress reduction skills to design a brief intervention for implementation in primary care. Throughout the process, stakeholders were consulted about iterations of the intervention for perceived feasibility and acceptability. We tested the resulting intervention, the Psychology Toolbox, in a pilot Type II Hybrid trial at the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center for patient and implementation outcomes. This project was funded by the National Institutes of Mental Health (PI: Yang, JP).
