Christina Scanlon

Dr. Scanlon is the Executive Director of the Development-in-Sociocultural-Context Research Lab and Research Associate at the University of Chicago’s Crown School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice. With a PhD in Applied Developmental Psychology from the University of Pittsburgh, her research focuses on understanding youth risk and resilience as a product of sociocultural influences, developmental competencies, and sociohistorical context, especially among those from marginalized and minoritized backgrounds. She uses daily diary, mixed-method, and participatory action research designs to better understand how youth’s context-based phenomenological experiences in both real-world and virtual spaces influence socioemotional development, coping, and mental health over the course of adolescence. Scanlon also has extensive expertise in creating and implementing developmentally appropriate, ecologically valid interventions within schools, after-school programming, and community-based settings. 

Her peer-reviewed research has been published in outlets such as Child Development, Developmental Psychology, American Educational Research Journal, American Psychologist, Learning and Instruction, and Journal of School Psychology. She regularly presents this work at national conferences, including the American Educational Research Association (AERA) and the Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD). In addition, she has delivered invited talks and keynotes for University of Chicago initiatives such as the Urban Education Institute's Network for College Success and the To&Through Project.