Tommy Chou

Education

B.A. Psychology/Sociology, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH M.A. Psychology, Boston University, Boston, MA

Research Interests

In my research, I engage with communities and stakeholders to identify and leverage natural, resource-efficient opportunities that promote resilience and healthy development among children and families impacted by socioeconomic disadvantage. My professional interests also include the potential for new technologies to overcome traditional barriers to mental health services and knowledge, and the application of design thinking and interdisciplinary team science in examining and addressing social problems.

Parent-Preschooler Emotion Narratives: Reading to promote literacy and socioemotional competency in urban communities of poverty

Dissertation and training funded via an NICHD F31 NRSA Project conducted in partnership with Miami Children's Initiative

This project aims to develop a preschool reading intervention that includes a children’s book to help parents explain, label, and discuss emotions and a brief training to help them maximize their preschooler’s emotional learning as related to the characters and story. I am collaborating with Miami Children’s Initiative to develop and refine the book and training by combining scientific knowledge related to preschool literacy and socio-emotional competence with local knowledge from black and African American families living in Miami’s neighborhoods of high poverty and violence. Throughout the dissertation, I am inviting parents to receive the training and read the book with their preschoolers over four weeks to obtain parent feedback and to evaluate promise of the intervention to improve preschoolers’ knowledge of emotions, parent responses to emotions, and parent-preschooler discussion of emotions.

Awards

Charles and Carol Spielberger Scholarship, APF/COGDOP, 2018-2019
 
Psychology Graduate Student Dissertation Seed Fund Award, 2017-2018
 
Student Award Honorable Mention, The Delaware Project, 2017

Select Publications

Chou, T., & Frazier, S.L. (in press). CORE: Compassion Oriented Reflection and Engagement to Guide Academic-Community Partnership. Journal of Participatory Research Methods.

Chou, T., & Frazier, S.L. (2019). Supporting ethical practice in community-engaged research with 4R: Respond, Record, Reflect, and Revise. Ethics & Behavior.

Frazier, S.L., Chou, T., Ouellette, R.R., Helseth, S.A., Hedemann, E.R., & Cromer, K.D. (2019). Workforce Support for Urban After-School Programs: Turning Obstacles into Opportunities. American Journal of Community Psychology. 0, 1-14.

Shernoff, E.S., Frazier, S.L., Lisetti, C., Buche, C., Brown, C., Lunn, S., Delamarre, A., Chou, T., Gabbard, J. & Morgan, E. (2018). Early Career Teacher Professional Development: Bridging Simulation Technology with Evidence-Based Behavior Management. Journal of Technology and Teacher Education. 26(2), 299-326.

Chou, T., Comer, J.S., Turvey, C.L., Karr, A., & Spargo, G. (2016). Technical considerations for the delivery of real-time child telemental health care. Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology.

Cornacchio, D., Chou, T., Sacks, H., Pincus, D.B., & Comer, J.S. (2015). Clinical consequences of the revised DSM-5 definition of agoraphobia in treatment-seeking anxious youth. Depression and Anxiety.

Chou, T., Cornacchio, D., Cooper-Vince, C., Crum, K., & Comer, J. S. (2015) DSM-5 and the assessment of childhood anxiety disorders: Meaningful progress or persistent diagnostic quagmires? Psychopathology Review.

Comer, J. S., Dantowitz, A., Chou, T., Edson, A. L., Elkins, R. M., Kerns, C., Brown, B., & Green, J. G. (2014). Psychological adjustment among area youth after the Boston Marathon bombing and subsequent manhunt. Pediatrics, 134, 7-14.

Comer, J.S., Kerns, C., Elkins, R.M., Edson, A.L., Chou, T., Dantowitz, A., Miguel, E., Brown, B., Coxe, S., & Green, J.G. (2014). Adjustment among children with relatives who participated in the manhunt following the Boston Marathon attack. Depression and Anxiety, 31, 542-550.

Ganea, P. A., Canfield, C. F., Ghafari, K. S., & Chou, T. (2014). Do cavies talk? The effect of anthropomorphic books on children’s knowledge about animals. Frontiers in Developmental Psychology, 5, 283.

Select Presentations

Chou, T., Atkins, M.S., Dinizulu, S.M., Frazier, S.L., Lindsey, M.A., & Massetti, G. (2019, November). Community Violence: Promoting change by bridging science, training, policy, and practice. Association of Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies Annual Convention. Atlanta, GA.

Chou, T., Ramos, G., Bufka, L., DeRosier, M., Frazier, S. L., Isaia, A., & Kia-Keating, M. (2018, November). Ethics and Policy in Technology-based Research. Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies Annual Convention. Washington, D.C.

Bry, L., Bufka, L.J., Chou, T., Comer, J.S., Mohr, D.C., Weingardt, K.R. (2016, October). Overcoming traditional barriers only to encounter new ones: Doses of caution as the exciting field of behavioral telehealth begins to “go live”. Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies Annual Convention. New York City, NY.

Chou, T., Carpenter, A. L., Elkins, R. M., Kerns, C. E., Dantowitz, A., & Comer, J. S. (2014, November). Was Type of Traumatic Exposure Associated with Differential Child Outcomes Following the Boston Marathon Bombing? In A.L. Carpenter (Chair), Psychological Adjustment among Area Youth after the Boston Marathon Bombing and Subsequent Manhunt. Paper presented at the 48th annual meeting of the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies. Philadelphia, PA.

Chou, T., Kerns, C., Pincus, D., Hofmann, S., & Comer, J. S. (2014, May). Evaluation of subtype revisions for social anxiety disorder in DSM-5. In T. Chou (Chair), Square Pegs and Round Slots: Evaluating key DSM-5 definitional changes for the assessment of anxiety disorders. Symposium conducted at the 26th Annual Convention of the Association for Psychological Science, San Francisco, CA.

Chou, T., Edson, A. E., Albano, A., Barlow, D. H., Becker, C. B., Gallo, K. P., Khanna, M., & Tolin, D. (2013, November). Giving the People What They Want: Recent innovations and future directions in direct-to-consumer marketing of evidence-based psychological treatments. Discussion panel presented at the 2013 Annual Association of Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies Convention, Nashville, TN.