Department Kudos

SAVE THE DATES 

UPCOMING FACULTY DEVELOPMENT SEMINAR

The next Faculty Development Seminar is:

• Wednesday March 19, 2025 from 9-10:30am – Becoming a Consultant
• Wednesday May 21, 2025 from 9-10:30am – Promotion Readiness: Writing Your Personal Statement

WRITING GROUPS: UPCOMING

The Faculty Writing Group is the first Wednesday of every month from 8:00-9:00am. However, there will not be a writing group in September. These meetings are on Zoom. This group is for faculty including adjunct faculty.

SPOTLIGHTS

FACULTY SPOTLIGHT: Joseph Mathias, MD

Joseph Mathias’ primary role at Emory is serving as the Director of Outpatient Services at the Emory Addiction Center. He also serves as the Site Director for the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Fellow Addiction Rotation, as well as the Site Supervisor for the Psychiatric Clerkship Rotation at the Emory Addiction Center. He has been a member of the department’s Racial, Equity and Cultural Minority (RECM) Subcommittee since 2021 and as of 2024, has been appointed as co-chair of this committee.  

Outside of Emory, Joseph has been serving as the Associate Education Director for the Addiction Alliance of Georgia since 2022. As part of this role, he has helped develop and launch a successful week-long immersion program for healthcare professional students across different universities in Georgia promoting substance use disorder education/training in healthcare curriculum.

Joseph most enjoys the connections he makes with his patients, some who are adolescents as young as 14, and others who are in their 80’s. These connections instill hope for positive change, and he believes he can help individuals get out of moments of despair. Building longitudinal relationships with his patients has been one of the most rewarding aspects of his job. Seeing them flourish after struggling is impactful, but also being there for them while they are in a moment of crisis, is equally as meaningful. Every patient he treats has a story unique to them. He enjoys building a relationship of trust needed to help them in their most vulnerable moments. 

Being part of the Emory Addiction Services has been one of the key highlights for Joseph in his career and career development. The service started off small with just Justine Welsh, and she built a team of well-rounded individuals, both professionally and personally, to treat an underserved population here in Georgia. He is grateful for the success the service has had and the opportunity to be able to expand services to treat even more patients not only in Metro Atlanta, but across the state. Being promoted as the Director of Outpatient Services and in a leadership capacity has been rewarding and provided him with a great opportunity to grow as a physician and leader.

Looking to the future, Joseph would like to continue playing an intricate part in expanding addiction services, both clinical and educational, at the clinic. His area of interest clinically is treating adolescents with substance use disorders and as they build out the clinic space to have a dedicated adolescent substance use disorder treatment service, he hopes to help develop that clinical program further.

Away from work, Joseph’s weeknights and weekends are spent with his family. He and his wife Emilie have two boys, Shepherd (4) and Cambridge (3), who keep them busy with sports commitments and playdates with friends. They are also expecting another child in February, so life will only get busier! When he does have free time, he enjoys the Atlanta sports scene. He is a huge basketball fan and tries to make it to as many Atlanta Hawks games as possible. He is also a passionate backyard BBQ’er and has spent countless hours on the weekend smoking racks of ribs, whole chickens and pork butts.

ADJUNCT FACULTY SPOTLIGHT: Beth-Sarah Wright, PhD, MPhil

Beth-Sarah Wright is an educator, mental health advocate, author and co-founder of Thrive With Dignity, a consulting organization dedicated to helping mission-driven institutions align authentically with their purpose. With over 27 years of experience as a professor, researcher and senior leader, she created the DIGNITY Lens©, a framework centered on human dignity with seven strategies to interrogate organizational integrity and foster alignment with institutional values. Built around seven strategies, the DIGNITY Lens© empowers all stakeholders, not just those with formal authority, to identify and close organizational gaps.  

As the author of eight books, including Me, Depressed: A Story of Depression from Denial to Discovery, DIGNITY: Seven Strategies for Creating Authenticity, and Deep Joy: 40 Meditations for Your Journey, Beth-Sarah explores the pursuit of authenticity, respect for human dignity and the courage to confront difficult truths. Her writing reflects her journey through cultural differences, faith, healing and her struggles with depression, offering a way to connect with our shared humanity. Storytelling is transformative, and creating brave spaces for people to share their stories is essential for healing, recovery and peace.

Beth-Sarah most recently served as the director of enrollment management at Holy Innocents’ Episcopal School in Atlanta, the largest parish Episcopal school in the country, for 10 years before launching Thrive With Dignity. She is a former professor at New York University and Spelman College in expository writing and the director and lecturer of the African Diaspora and the World program, respectively. She earned her PhD in Performance Studies from NYU, focusing on corporeal healing of historical trauma in Jamaican Dancehall Culture; an MPhil in Anthropology from Cambridge University, with research on the intersection of identity politics, power and performance poetry in Black Britain and a BA in Sociology and Afro-American Studies from Princeton University (magna cum laude). She is originally from Jamaica and has lived and studied globally. She is married to Robert C. Wright, the Episcopal Bishop of Atlanta, and together they have raised five beautiful adult children. 

As an adjunct faculty member, Beth-Sarah’s focus has been on integrating suicide awareness and prevention, faith and cultural sensitivity within the broader context of mental health and healing and has served on the Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice Committee (DISC). In her Grand Rounds lecture, she used data to highlight the increasing prevalence of depression and anxiety among medical students and others, emphasizing the transformative power of vulnerability and importance of sharing personal struggles and stories to enhance the healing journey. She has been honored to share insights and encouragement with diverse audiences locally, nationally and internationally, helping them navigate the often-challenging intersections of faith, mental health challenges and healing.

Beth-Sarah works with communities to develop strategies for fostering healing in diverse settings, always recognizing that dignity is the foundation of any mental health intervention. As a sought-after keynote speaker, she has addressed faith communities, educational institutions and organizations such as the Care and Counseling Center of Georgia, Lee Arrendale State Prison for Women, Will for Hope’s Annual Mental Health Connections Week, the Morehouse School of Medicine, Candler School of Theology, Women in the Spirit of St. John Chrysostom Episcopal Church in Golden, Colorado and Rainbow Village, to name just a few, on these topics of faith, mental health and healing. 

As a Jamaican and trained anthropologist and ethnographer, she must address mental health through an intercultural lens, exploring how different communities understand and respond to mental health challenges. In the ongoing effort to destigmatize mental health, she emphasizes cultural sensitivity while grounding all discussions in the fundamental value of human dignity. Finally, Beth-Sarah is passionate about helping organizations create environments where human wellness is cared for and nurtured. Through the DIGNITY Lens©, she focuses on fostering spaces where individuals can thrive holistically, recognizing wellness is core to building thriving communities.

What Beth-Sarah most enjoys about her role as an adjunct faculty member is the opportunity to raise awareness about mental health challenges while emphasizing the hope help and healing are always possible. Engaging in conversations about suicide awareness, prevention and the stigma surrounding depression and other mental health challenges is both a profound responsibility and a great privilege. She also values the chance to represent the cutting-edge and pioneering work of Emory's Department of Psychiatry, which continues to advance understanding, treatment and advocacy in mental health. It is significant and humbling when someone shares reading one of her books or hearing a speech has given them the support or clarity they needed—sometimes even saving their lives. Moments like these remind her of the profound impact of open dialogue, education and innovation in fostering understanding, resilience and hope.

People may be surprised to learn when Beth-Sarah began my PhD work at NYU in 1997, many discouraged her from having children, as she was only 24 and recently engaged to be married. However, she was deeply passionate about both her academic aspirations and starting a family and was determined not to sacrifice one for the other. With the unwavering support of her husband and family, she became the first woman in her program and second person to complete the PhD, all with three babies in tow! This experience taught Beth-Sarah invaluable lessons about resilience, supporting others through challenging circumstances and institutions' critical role in fostering environments where individuals can bring their whole and authentic selves. She often says her first son was NYU’s youngest freshman, as the university allowed her to teach with him in the classroom when he was just three months old. She would breastfeed and care for him while simultaneously teaching her class of 18- and 19-year-old first-year students. This journey fuels her passion for creating communities that are accessible and inclusive, where everyone can truly thrive with dignity. 

STAFF SPOTLIGHT: Natalie Merrill

Natalie Merrill is the Manager of Program and Research at the Grady Trauma Project (GTP). She is involved in many of the behind-the-scenes processes that make our research happen. This includes maintaining our data infrastructure, lab supply procurement, IRB protocols, training new employees and generally troubleshooting when something isn’t quite working as it is supposed to. She is also the data manager and thus responsible for making sure the data are organized, data requests are fulfilled and datasets are maintained with integrity for the almost 13,000 participants interviewed over the years. She is also a member of the Emory@Grady choir. 

Outside of Emory, Natalie is a mom to two sweet children and involved in a few social groups in Atlanta (for example, book clubs, alumni groups and school parent-teacher organization).

The tasks Natalie enjoys most are the data-related ones because she loves the feeling of making things organized. However, on a higher level, she most appreciates the GTP’s research “does good” in the community. In the short-term, the interviewers provide participants with a listening ear, and help get participants connected to resources. In the long-term, the work contributes to the development of better treatments for PTSD. 

Natalie majored in Psychology at Spring Hill College, a Jesuit college in Mobile, AL. Afterwards, she worked in Robyn Fivush’s lab on research projects about autobiographical memory, gender and child development. She graduated with a PhD from the Department of Psychology at Emory in 2016. As part of her thesis on intergenerational narratives, she published in the journal Developmental Review. She has been delighted to see how many researchers cited the work and continue to investigate the impact of memory across generations. During the first two years of the pandemic, she was a stay-at-home parent homeschooling her children and it was a big decision to return to the workforce after such a challenging time. She is so happy to be back and once more contributing to science.  

Looking to the future, she is excited to be involved in several projects at GTP and looks forward to seeing them come to fruition as it takes on the planning, data collection, analysis and write-up phases of the different studies. She is taking the lead on a qualitative analysis for one of the studies and plans to write an article for publication once the analysis is complete. 

Outside of work, Natalie has hobbies like singing, painting watercolors and playing ukelele. She loves to read fantasy classics and watch K-dramas and Hallmark Christmas movies. She also enjoys volunteering for L’arche Atlanta, a community of people with and without disabilities. 

TRAINEE SPOTLIGHT: Andrew (Andy) Ross, MA

As a doctoral intern, Andy Ross facilitates evidence-based, person-centered and culturally responsive individual and group therapy (e.g., Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) for patients across the lifespan at Grady Hospital and Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta. He additionally conducts comprehensive psychological testing, prepares integrated reports, provides diagnostic feedback and develops individualized treatment plans in collaboration with patients. Further, he currently supervises doctoral students working at Grady Hospital’s Behavioral Health Outpatient Center.

Prior to his internship at Emory School of Medicine, he was a graduate student in the Department of Psychology at the University of Rochester in New York, where he conducted research broadly investigating mental and physical health risk and resilience among individuals with histories of early life adversity. He remains in collaboration with his advisors and colleagues from the University of Rochester while he completes his clinical internship. Additionally, he completed clinical practicum experiences at a range of training sites in Rochester, including a community health center, private practice and medical center.

One aspect of the work that Andy enjoys most is his ability to form strong relationships with patients in spite of differing identities and backgrounds. For example, throughout his work within the Nia Project, it has been challenging but also incredibly rewarding for him to build safe and trusting relationships with women of color who have experienced violence perpetrated by men. It is very fulfilling to be able to work through the initial barriers to his working relationship with patients and be a model for a positive and safe male relationship. He additionally appreciates the dynamic nature of his work, such that the types of clinical services he provides and responsibilities hes manage vary each day of the week. 

Andy had an extremely positive experience receiving his graduate education at the University of Rochester. His co-mentors, Dr. Liz Handley and Dr. Sheree Toth, and additional supervisors and colleagues provided him with invaluable training in both research and clinical work. He additionally was able to provide clinical services to some of the same patients who participated in the research studies he was involved in and developed a heightened understanding of the bidirectional relationship between research and clinical practice.

Andy has also greatly appreciated the breadth of his clinical training as an intern at Emory, where he has been exposed to new and complex patient populations and clinical settings (e.g., Grady Hospital's Inpatient Psychiatric Service). He is also extremely proud he successfully defended his dissertation this past September. His dissertation was comprised of three investigations which explored multifinality in developmental outcomes following exposure to childhood maltreatment and parent substance use disorder.

Looking to the future, Andy is currently applying for postdoctoral fellowship positions in both hospital and private practice settings. His plan is to become licensed as a clinical psychologist and provide intervention and assessment services for patients across the lifespan. He also intends to continue engaging in research grounded in developmental psychopathology. Finally, he aims to continue supervising and collaborating with trainees at earlier stages of their professional development.

Outside of the workplace, Andy loves exploring Atlanta’s many restaurants, traveling when possible, biking and playing tennis and pickleball. 

MENTOR SPOTLIGHT: Chanda Graves, PhD, ABPP (written by Molly Millians, DEd)

At first, I was hesitant about working with a mentor, especially one I had not met in person and who worked in a different department location. Also, I was hesitant because I am not a psychologist or a medical provider, but I function in a related position as a translational special educator with the Emory Neurodevelopmental Exposure Clinic (ENEC). But once I met Chanda Graves, Associate Professor and Distinguished Psychologist in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, I was no longer apprehensive and quickly saw the value of mentorship. It is a privilege to have Chanda as a mentor. Her impact on children and adolescents with HIV, chronic illnesses and mental health issues have improved lives both in educational settings and throughout communities. Her willingness to share her wisdom and experiences, as well as her encouragement are important for professional growth,  

In our meetings, Chanda shared not only her successes but also the challenges she faced working with schools and supporting families. Her openness and willingness to discuss both ends of the spectrum resonated deeply with me, as many of her experiences overlapped with my own. This reflection of her journey encouraged me to rethink and refine my approach to working with families, schools and other community providers, leading to impactful changes in my practice. 

Chanda’s guidance was instrumental as I prepared for promotion. She helped me to reframe my professional contributions, particularly those related to the impact of prenatal exposures on children and their families and present them in ways that would resonate in a medical environment. Her mentorship encouraged me to communicate my perspective more effectively at ENEC and within the department.

Chanda’s openness, her deep knowledge and her supportive nature make her an invaluable mentor. She brings an approachable, insightful presence that enriches the professional lives of those she guides, and her mentorship has had a lasting, positive impact on my career, as well as others she has mentored. 

NEW FACULTY

Patricia Aguayo, MD, MPH, MBA – Patricia Aguayo earned her medical degree at Universidad Anahuac in Mexico City, Mexico, and a Master of Public Health degree at the University of Arizona. She completed her psychiatry residency at New York Medical College, where she served as chief resident and went on to pursue a fellowship in child and adolescent psychiatry at Yale University School of Medicine. During her last year at Yale, she was the John E. Showalter chief resident.

Patricia worked in Connecticut in both outpatient and inpatient settings, focusing her practice on patients with Autism with challenging behaviors. She moved to the University of Utah to head their Autism HOME program, an innovative medical home serving individuals with Autism and related disabilities through the life span. She has also remained active in teaching and training at the Yale Child Study Center. Patricia joined the Emory University School of Medicine’s Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences as an assistant professor. Her interests include Autism Spectrum Disorders and related disabilities, challenging behaviors and transition to adulthood and advocacy for families. She is committed to advancing the field by educating medical students, residents, and fellows. Patricia is board certified in Psychiatry and Child and Adolescent Psychiatry by the ABPN. 

Vincent Costa, PhD – Vincent (Vinny) Costa is a new associate professor in the department. His lab is located at the Emory National Primate Research Center, where he is also a core scientist in the Division of Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience. Before joining the faculty, he was an assistant professor in the Division of Neuroscience at Oregon Health and Science University. He earned his PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience from the University of Florida in 2011 and completed postdoctoral training in Systems Neuroscience in the Laboratory of Neuropsychology at NIMH in 2018.

Research in Vinny’s lab focuses on understanding how motivational neural circuits that control the drive to act and feel, interact with the prefrontal cortical circuits that have expanded in nonhuman primates and humans to govern learning and decision-making. The Costa lab's general approach is to record the activity of hundreds of neurons in monkeys' brains while they play video games. Although everyone in the Costa lab is terrible at playing video games, the speed and accuracy with which the monkeys solve the challenges in the games are remarkable. By recording the activity of neurons in different brain regions, Vinny and his team can identify the contributions of each region to the monkeys’ performance during these tasks.

At Emory, the Costa lab is combining this approach with chemogenetic manipulations and transcriptomic characterizations of amygdala circuitry. This combined approach allows them to determine how specific brain connections help or hinder the monkeys' ability to make decisions. Poor decision-making is a symptom of many neurological and psychiatric diseases, and the ultimate goal of the lab is to understand the neuroscience of learning and decision-making in enough detail to potentially intervene and reduce poor decision-making. For example, as a lifelong New York Mets baseball team fan, Vinny is particularly invested in preventing others from making the mistake of rooting for the Atlanta Braves baseball team. In his free time Vinny enjoys drinking wine and visiting art museums, his favorite brain region is the amygdala, and he has a passionate dislike of beaches and sand.  

Kendra Le, DO – Kendra Le completed her doctorate in osteopathic medicine at Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine in Blacksburg, VA. She moved to San Antonio, TX, to complete residency training at the University of Incarnate Word and served as chief resident in the 2022-23 academic year. She completed her fellowship in Geriatric Psychiatry at Emory University and is excited to continue working at Emory in the geriatric psychiatry department and transitions program. She is interested in providing care for older adults transitioning to different stages in life while at the same time coping with mental illness. She is looking forward to working with trainees and learning from others along the way. 

Outside of work, Kendra enjoys karaoke, snowboarding, dancing and spending time with her Great Pyrenees/German Shepherd mix, Torrance, who just received his Canine Good Citizen certification and is currently training to pursue further certification to provide psychiatric services to patients as a therapy dog. 

Nick Thompson, MD – Nick Thompson works primarily at Emory University Hospital with the Consult Liaison team, where he provides psychiatric evaluations and guidance for patients admitted for medical and surgical care. Working as part of an interdisciplinary team, he helps ensure patients' mental health needs are met and they are connected to important outpatient resources. Nick also likes integrating psychotherapy into his approach to patient care, allowing him to better understand and support their psychiatric needs. He is passionate about medical education and enjoys teaching and supervising psychiatry residents and medical students.

In addition, Nick is involved with Emory’s Integrated Behavioral Health service, where he collaborates with a behavioral health manager to offer mental health support at the Emory St. Joseph’s Primary Care Clinic. This work helps expand access to psychiatric care, reaching a broader population of patients than he could serve individually.

Outside of work, Nick enjoys spending time with his wife and their two-year-old son, who is currently obsessed with Stevie Nicks and requests Rumours to be played on repeat every day. Nick also loves hiking, rock climbing and playing board games.

DISC GETTING TO KNOW YOU

Jan Mooney, PhD, Postdoctoral Resident - I am a 34-year-old US-born Indian American woman. It has been interesting to me to consider while my parents emigrated from the same country, they came from very different socioeconomic contexts. From my perspective, I imagine this heavily shaped their approach to work, parenting and financial decisions (among other areas). I have not visited India very much, nor am I familiar with the geography of the areas where my parents lived. In my experience, neither of my parents were very interested in carrying on the traditions, ceremonies or religious activities they experienced throughout their lives, so many of our traditions (e.g., a family meal for Thanksgiving) are adopted and modified traditions (e.g., adding Indian dishes) my brother and I are familiar with from our early school years and friendships with others. Perhaps because both of my parents are immigrants and my mother was a US visa-holding student, I am particularly sensitive to the challenges US visa-holding students face throughout and beyond their formal education in the US. During graduate school, the invisibility of these challenges was very apparent in the way administrators and sometimes faculty lacked recognition of the employment, academic, social and personal challenges that can come along with a student visa. This adjacent point-of-view, separate from lived experience, allows me a unique role as informed advocate – I am grateful for the extremely important first-person perspectives shared by visa-holding students, and find this equips me well to summarize and advance the priorities that will improve their educational and overall quality of life. Overall, this has led me in the direction of seeking more training in policy advocacy and impact analysis, and though my interests have broadened and focused in other areas (specifically in health policy advocacy), I still believe in and support efficient paths to postgraduate employment and citizenship for visa-holding students. My hope is with enough educational advocacy in this area, legislation will mirror what we already know: that our workforce is and will continue to be greatly improved and enriched by the presence of those who brought with them diverse and important experiences when they began their educational careers in the US as visa-holding students.

WELLNESS COMMITTEE

The Wellness Committee is recruiting members! 

If you have an interest in helping others make better lifestyle choices and create a culture of wellness, we need you! We’re looking for members in the Department who are available to meet at least once a month.

Contact Elizabeth McCord and Charlotte Van Hale if interested. 

FACULTY KUDOS

Research

Peter Ash and Reema Dedania had a book chapter accepted for publication in the Oxford Textbook for Correctional Medicine. The title of the chapter is "Jail Based Competency Retoration," and will be out for print in 2025.  

Au M, Lipschutz R, Mekawi Y, Lathan EC, Dixon HD, Carter S, Hinrichs R, Bradley B, Kaslow NJ, Nugent NR, & Powers A. (2024). The effect of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy on PTSD and depression symptoms in trauma-exposed black adults: Pilot randomized controlled trial results. Journal of Mood & Anxiety Disorders, 8, 100092. doi: 10.1016/j.xjmad.2024.100092

Bekhbat M. Glycolytic metabolism: Food for immune cells, fuel for depression?  Brain Behav Immun Health. 2024 Aug 14;40. 

Broce C, Kemp CA, Hasan R, Larson NE, Alvarado AB, Shirley J, & Constantino JN. (online ahead of print, 2024 September 4). Restoring decency to the care of undomiciled foster youth. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, S0890-8567(24)01834-3. doi: 10.1016/j.jaac.2024.08.484

Chengappa KNR, Cotes RO. Clozapine's High Incidence of Ileus and Pneumonia Demand Better Clinical Strategies-How Do We Get There? Am J Psychiatry. 2024 Oct 1;181(10):851-853. 

Cohen V, Clark SM, Saker KM, Dunn SE, Watson-Singleton NN, & Kaslow NJ. (2024). Intimate partner violence and barriers to leaving among low-income African American women: The role of self-esteem as a mediating factor. African American Studies, 28, 283-297. doi: 10.1007/s12111-024-09671-8

Constantino JN, & Dilly LJ. (Published online October 9, 2024). An architecture for transformation in child mental health. JAMA Psychiatry.

Fani N. (in press, Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging). Torture as a Trauma of Disconnection: Neuroplastic Alterations in Torture Survivors.

Hinojosa CA, van Rooij SJH, Fani N, Ellis RA, Harnett NG, Lebois LAM, Ely TD, Jovanovic T, Murty VP, House SL, Beaudoin FL, An X, Neylan TC, Clifford GD, Ressler KJ, Stevens JS. Reward neurocircuitry predicts longitudinal changes in alcohol use following trauma exposure. Biol Psychiatry Cogn Neurosci Neuroimaging. 2024 Oct 8:S2451-9022(24) 

Kondas A, McDermott TJ, Ahluwalia V, Haller OC, Karkare MC, Guelfo A, Daube A, Bradley B, Powers A, Stevens JS, Ressler KJ, Siegle GJ, Fani N. White matter correlates of dissociation in a diverse sample of trauma-exposed women. Psychiatry Research. 2024 Oct 15;342

Ku BS, Yuan Q, Haardörfer R, Addington J, Bearden CE, Cadenhead KS, Cannon TD, Cornblatt BA, Keshavan M, Mathalon DH, Perkins DO, Stone W, Woods SW, Druss BG, Walker E, Anglin DM. Neighborhood ethnoracial diversity and positive psychotic symptoms among youth at high-risk and healthy comparisons. Psychiatry Res. 2024 Oct 2;342

Maples-Keller JL, Hyatt CS, Phillips NL, Sharpe BM, Sherrill A, Yasinski C, Reiff C, Rakofsky J, Rauch SAM, Dunlop BW, Rothbaum BO. Rapid Effects of MDMA Administration on Self-Reported Personality Traits and Affect State: A Randomized, Placebo-Controlled Trial in Healthy Adults. J Psychoactive Drugs. 2024 Oct 23:1-9.

Mbu P, White D, Simmons S, Gordon-Achebe K, Praylow T, Kodish I. Addressing the Multidimensional Aspects of Trauma in Emergency Department Boarding for Neurodiverse Youth. Child Adolesc Psychiatr Clin N Am. 2024 Oct;33(4):595-607. 

Moran L, Wiese CW, Arriaga RI, Abdullah S, & Sherrill AM. (in press). Technology in mental health work: Challenges and opportunities. In T. S. Behrend (Ed.), The Future of Human-Technology Partnerships at Work. 

Niu W, Yu S, Li X, Wang Z, Chen R, Michalski C, Jahangiri A, Zohdy Y, Chern JJ, Whitworth TJ, Wang J, Xu J, Zhou Y, Qin Z, Li B, Gambello MJ, Peng J, Wen Z. Longitudinal multi-omics reveals pathogenic TSC2 variants disrupt developmental trajectories of human cortical organoids derived from Tuberous Sclerosis Complex.  bioRxiv [Preprint]. 2024 Oct.

Oliver KI, Stenson A, van Rooij SJH, Johnson CB 2nd, Ely TD, Powers A, Minton ST, Wiltshire C, Kim YJ, Hinrichs R, Jovanovic T, Stevens JS. Impacts of early life adversity on the neurocircuitry of emotional memory in children. Dev Psychopathol. 2024 Oct 29:1-12.

Patton SC, Watkins LE, Killeen TK, Hien DA. Curr Psychiatry Rep. 2024 Oct 16. Posttraumatic Stress Disorder and Substance Use Disorder Screening, Assessment, and Treatment. 

Rocha M, Daniels K, Chandrasekaran S, Michopoulos V. Trauma and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder as Important Risk Factors for Gestational Metabolic Dysfunction. Am J Perinatol. 2024 Oct;41(14):1895-1907.

Ryu M, Evans HI, Hsieh T, Zhou J, Akers KW, Sherrill AM, & Arriaga RI. (2024). Using sensor-captured patient-generated data to support clinician intuition and patient self-report in PTSD therapy. Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing, 8, 149. doi:10.1145/363742

Sherrill AM, Wiese CW, Abdullah S, & Arriaga RI. (in press). Teaming with artificial intelligence to learn and sustain psychotherapy delivery skills: Workplace, ethical, and research implications. Journal of Technology in Behavioral Science.

Honors, Awards, Rankings

Brandon Kitay has been accepted into the 2025 Emory Professional Leadership Enrichment and Development Program (EM-ProLEAD). 

Erica Lee has been selected to serve on the Board of Directors of the American Board of Professional Psychology Foundation.

Ann Schwartz was appointed as the Treasurer for the Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry. 

Andrew Sherrill was invited to the Research Facilitation Committee of the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies. 

David Thylur, Nick Thompson and Caitlin Smith won an award for best case report published in the Journal of the Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry. The case report is titled “The intersection of gender dysphoria and psychosis: case report of a patient with schizophrenia, gender dysphoria, and repeated genital self-mutilation.”

Media

Negar Fani (1) Neurology Today - Racial Discrimination Contributes to Cellular Aging and Neurodegeneration, Study Finds.

Presentations

The following faculty spoke at the Southern Medical Association' Annual Scientific Assembly meeting:

• Yilang Tang's lecture was entitled "Screening/Treatment of Alcohol Use Disorders in Non-Specialty Healthcare Settings"
• Paul Earley’s lecture was entitled "Neurobiology of Addiction"
• Karen Drexler’s lecture was entitled "Treatment of Opioid Use Disorder/Treatment of Substance Use Disorder"

Claire Coles and Julie Kable presented at grand rounds at the University of Queensland on the Healthy Brain & Child Development Study and the Emory University Neurodevelopment & Exposures Clinic.

Reema Dedania presented at the annual forensic psychiatry meeting (The American Academy of Psychiatry and Law) on the topic New Frontiers in Conspiracy Theories (an invited lecture on the role of forensic examiners in conducting threat assessments for lone actor violence/terrorism and distinguishing between mental illness and conspiratorial thinking).  

Ellis DM. (2024, October). Culturally Responsive Digital Mental Health: Old Strategies, New Insights [Oral presentation]. Georgia State University: Clinical Psychology Research Day – Keynote Speaker

Negar Fani (1) “The invisible burdens of minoritized stress: examining the toll of racial trauma on neurophysiology, and promising neurotechnologies for stress relief.” McLean Hospital/Harvard Medical School Grand Rounds Lecture Series, Boston, MA, October 24th, 2024. (2) “Taking a load off of the brain: Mechanisms and applications of vibration-augmented mindfulness.” NIH Behavioral and Social Sciences Research Festival, Bethesda, MD, November 6, 2024.

David Goldsmith and Justin Palanci presented at the ISPS-US conference on "Incorporating the Voices of Lived Experience of Psychosis into Medical Education." 

Toby Goldsmith served on a panel for the National Foundation for Women Legislators, discussing the importance of women's mental health programming. 

Mehta M, Sherrill AM, Rothbaum B, & Rauch SAM. (2024, November). Navigating the evolving needs of veterans and servicemembers: A case for transdiagnostic treatment. In Wyatt, J. (Chair), Expanding existing trauma-focused massed treatment programs: Implementation and Adaptation of the Unified Protocol as an Alternative Treatment Modality. Symposium presented at the annual conference for the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies, Philadelphia, PA. (Discussant)

Schwartz AC. “The feedback and remediation process: optimizing wellness and supporting learner progression while navigating the evolving landscape in CL psychiatry.” Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry Annual Meeting, Miami, FL, 2024 (workshop presentation). 

Sherrill AM. (2024, October). Exposure therapy for trauma-related OCD: A case study on choosing exposure targets with a Latino military veteran. Case Presentation presented at the Advanced Forum for the International Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder Foundation in Toronto, ON. (Presenter)

Sherrill AM, Abdullah S, Arriaga RI, & Wiese CW. (2024, November). Teaming with AI to learn and maintain clinical skills in prolonged exposure: Development of TEAMMAIT (Trustworthy, Explainable, and Adaptive Monitoring Machine for AI Teams). In Held, P. (Chair), Generative Artificial Intelligence in PTSD Treatment: Exploring Different Use Cases of Novel Technologies. Symposium presented at the annual conference for the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies, Philadelphia, PA. (Presenter)

Sherrill AM, Rothbaum BO, Rauch SAM, Alaparthi J, Ryu M, Arriaga RI. (2024, November). Prolonged exposure collective sensing system: Pilot data on a ubiquitous computing system that facilitates communication about between-session exposures and enhances patient engagement In Wislocki, K & Malek, N. (Co-Chairs), Leveraging Technology to Support PTSD Assessment and Intervention for Veteran Populations. Symposium presented at the annual conference for the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies, Philadelphia, PA. (Presenter)

ADJUNCT FACULTY KUDOS

Stephanie Freitag (1) Pop Sugar – What it really means to be delusional when everyone is “delulu.” 

Wendy Jacobson (1) Newsweek – How to Deprogram the Cult of Donald Trump | Opinion.

Ren Massey (1) moderated a panel on Trauma-Informed Approach to Gender-Affirming Care at the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) Biennial Symposium in Lisbon, Portugal. (2) was awarded the WPATH Distinguished Education Award at the WPATH Symposium. (3) presented in the WPATH Global Education Institute (GEI) Courses in Lisbon, which he oversaw as the GEI Mental Health Chair, and moderated some of the GEI Foundations and Advanced courses on transgender/gender diverse mental health and care. 

Deb Simkin is doing the Executive MBA in Healthcare at Yale University.

Zhang S, Awachie T, Clarke A, Lasile OT, Bradshaw J, Williams GT-W, Dunn SE, Wootten JP, & Kaslow NJ. (2024). Reasons for living mediate between Africultural coping and suicide resilience. African American Studies, 28, 251-262. doi: 10.1007/s12111-024-09674-5

TRAINEE KUDOS

Weibo Niu was awarded the TSC Alliance Postdoctoral Fellowship. His project is titled “Understanding the Pathological Roles of Microglia in TSC,” with Zhexing Wen as his mentor and Michael J. Gambello as his co-mentor.