Research interests

Social-emotional development
Infancy
Parenting

Biography

Lauren was a Research Fellow at IAST. Her research examines the cultural and neurobiological underpinnings of parenting and social-emotional development. Most of her work has focused on understanding cultural beliefs about infant development as well as how the social and physical environment are linked to parents’ responses to their infants among the Gamo of Southern Ethiopia. More recently, she has investigated the role of maternal sensitivity and infant attachment in biobehavioral attunement between infants and their mothers. She received a Ph.D. in Child and Family Studies from the University of Tennessee and was a National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Training Fellow in Developmental Science at the University of Michigan prior to coming to IAST.