Principle Investigator: Dr. Liliana Lengua
Liliana Lengua studies children’s individual differences in response to the experiences of sociodemographic, psychosocial, family, and parenting risk factors. Children’s temperament, or individual differences in emotionality and self-regulation, differentiates children who are likely to develop problems in the face of risk from those who are resilient to those experiences.

Dr. Lengua’s most recent work examines the development of children’s self-regulation, a core aspect of their social and emotional competence. Stress, family functioning, parenting and physiology are studied as potential mechanisms in children’s developing self-regulation. The information gained from this study will be used to develop an intervention that will give parents the tools they need to help their children develop this critical skill.

Project Director: Dr. Rebecca Cortes
Rebecca Cortes is currently the project director for Project 1, 2, 3, GO! She studies the role of parents in the developmental integration of young children's emotion understanding and cognitive processes. Parents play an essential role in these processes because parents provide the foundation for children's emotional security and the support for children's developing ability to understand their own emotions and those of others. However, parenting skills can be compromised by stressful life events and inter- and intra-personal challenges. Thus, it is important to consider strategies and practices, such as mindfulness-based stress reduction, that may enhance the well-being of children through their parent's own well-being.

In addition to her research interests, Dr. Cortes is actively involved in several early learning efforts in Washington state and is a co-author of Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies® (PATHS), a classroom-based preschool curriculum aimed at enhancing children’s social and emotional competence.

Graduate Students

Stephanie Fengler Thompson: "My research interest concerns child adjustment in the face of ecological stressors. I am most interested in understanding how the interaction of child characteristics (temperament) and parenting behaviors predict trajectories of resilience (as conceptualized by emotion regulation, coping, etc.). This line of research is ultimately intended to examine potential interventions that might curb child psychopathologies and promote adaptive behaviors in children and parents."

Lyndsey Moran: "My research interests involve identifying factors, both social and cognitive/emotional, that effect a child’s risk for future development of psychopathologies. Specifically, I am interested in understanding how a child’s level of effortful control may play into his/her successful development."

Maureen Zalewski: "Studying differences between children's emotion regulation abilities fascinates me. I plan to continue studying this in children from a diverse range of family backgrounds, using both physiological and behavioral measures. I want to learn how emotion regulation differences relate to children's overall emotional well-being."

Cara Kiff: "My primary research interest is in the development of anxiety and depression in children. To explore this question I have looked at the interaction of children’s temperament characteristics and parenting behaviors to predict changes in anxiety and depression symptoms in preadolescent children. Now, I am looking to build on this work by examining how emotional dysregulation in preschool children relates to parenting behaviors, and in turn predicts the early development of psychopathology. Research has demonstrated that children’s biological-based emotional reactivity, or temperament, and parenting behavior each contributes to the development of problems. My interest is in understanding how these two factors shape each other over time to affect children’s development.

In a second line of research I am interested in understanding the role of broader contextual factors (e.g., family income) in the development of psychopathology. I have been working to understand how exposure to adversity across childhood and adolescence predicts the development of problems in childhood through adulthood."

Undergraduate Students

At Project 1, 2, 3, Go! our research assistants are typically undergradute students or recent graduates at the Univerity of Washington. At the beginning of Fall and Spring quarters, we train new research assistants to come on board and work with your families. Research assistants meet with families, collect and code data, and keep our project running! Our students love being part of Project 1, 2, 3, Go! and find it very rewarding. Meeting your families gives all of our research assistants a new perspective on children, families, and builds our compassion!

Our team has grown significantly since the beginning of our project. We currently have a team of experimenters, coders, and physio managers.

The experimenters are the research assistants that meet and work directly with your families. They run the sessions when you come in for your visits, and do everything they can to make sure you are having a great experience. We currently have 23 experimenters that are so excited to be working with you!

Our parent-child coding team consists of about a dozen individuals who have been enjoying watching you and your child interact in play and structured tasks. It’s especially fun to see how the children grow and change every time they return to the lab! We have an additional team of 10 people who watch the videos of your child individually performing our structured tasks. The children have been working so hard to complete all of our activities and are a delight to watch!

Our physio team is made up of 7 research assistants who work with the physiological data we collect during the session. When you come in for your visits, we measure your child’s heart rate and sweat activity so we can learn more about the physiology behind self-regulation. The physio team also works with the saliva samples that you return after completing your visits.

We’re so happy to have such a great team!