KEN MATHENY CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF STRESS, TRAUMA, AND RESILIENCE
Bringing together scholars and professionals from multiple disciplines to conduct research and develop interventions for stress and trauma prevention and to promote resilience.
Read the article “Dissociative Tendencies Aggregate the Impact of Negative Life Events on Non-Suicidal Self-Injury among Male Juvenile Delinquents,” co-authored by Rice, Ashby.
Read the article “International and Domestic Graduate Student Satisfaction with Life,” co-authored by Rice and others.
Center Co-Directors
Support the Ken Matheny Center for the Study of Stress, Trauma, and Resilience
“I am so pleased to have my name attached to the Center for Stress, Trauma, and Resilience. Much of my research and many of my publications were devoted to this research and to my teaching. The Center has already been highly useful to the pursuit of these important issues, and I am confident that its contributions will continue for the foreseeable future.”
—Ken Matheny
– Jeff Ashby
About the Center
Our Speakers
Note: The College of Education & Human Development building is located at 30 Pryor Street SW, Atlanta, GA.
Speaker: Dr. Yura Loscalzo, Research Fellow, University of Florence, Italy
Title: “The Adverse Consequences of Studyholism in Italian College Students”
Summary from Dr. Loscalzo:
“My main areas of research are Workaholism (or problematic overworking) and Studyholism (or problematic overstudying).
At Georgia State, I will talk about Studyholism, which is a construct that I developed during my Ph.D. studies to define problematic overstudying as a new potential clinical condition. More specifically, I defined it as an OCD-related disorder that is made up of high levels of study-related obsessive-compulsive symptoms and either low or high levels of Study Engagement. From this arises the distinction between Disengaged and Engaged Studyholics.
During my talk, I will present how I came to ideate the construct of Studyholism (in contrast to that of Study Addiction), and I will review the main results of the study I conducted aiming to test my theoretical model. More specifically, I will present individual and situational antecedents and outcomes of both Studyholism and Study Engagement. Also, I will review the differences between Engaged and Disengaged Studyholics concerning both antecedents and outcomes. I will conclude my talk with reference to the theoretical, preventive, and clinical implications of my study.”
For more information, contact Ken Rice at [email protected].
Speaker: Dr. Fernán Arana, School of Psychology, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina
Title: “Should We Care About Broken Hearts? A Cross-Cultural View of Romantic Breakups in University Students”
Summary from Dr. Arana: “Romantic dissolutions are considered “normative” events because of their high prevalence, but they can also be painful and stressful experiences. Although most of the emotions elicited by breakups tend to be transient, some complications might arise such as clinical depression, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), substance abuse and suicide attempts. That said, unveiling which processes turn a “broken heart” into a serious mental health issue is one of the main reasons for my research program at the University of Buenos Aires. I am particularly interested in the potential interaction of personality and relationship variables in the prediction of breakup distress.
The second reason for my program involves the inclusion of cultural values in romantic breakups. Because culture is often neglected in the literature of the field, we joined with Georgia State in a collaborative effort to disentangle to what extent breakups are affected by cultural values such as individualism and/or collectivism in Argentinean and U.S. students.
To sum up, I expect to give the audience a walk through to the history and recent research developments in the field of romantic breakups and show some fresh results from our own research program and collaboration. Naturally, I hope we can make room at the end of the talk to share some thoughts and discuss clinical implications.”
Speaker: Dr. Jennifer M. Gómez, Merrill Palmer Skillman Institute, Wayne State University
More information about Dr. Gómez can be found on her website: http://jmgomez.org/. For more information on cultural betrayal trauma theory, please view this short video:
Title: “Cultural Betrayal Trauma Theory: Inequality & Healing”
Summary from Dr. Gómez: “Interpersonal trauma, such as physical, sexual and psychological abuse, is linked with mental health outcomes, with some minority populations at increased risk for victimization. In drawing from the mainstream and minority trauma psychology literatures, I will define cultural betrayal trauma theory (CBTT; for example, Gómez, 2012), which suggests that interpersonal trauma in conjunction with discrimination affects diverse outcomes of trauma. For example, in CBTT, I propose that if a Black woman is sexually assaulted by a Black man, the outcomes of this trauma, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), are impacted by both the victim and perpetrator experiencing discrimination in society.
In addition to detailing the empirical evidence for CBTT, I will detail micro- and macro-level implications of CBTT, including the necessity of grappling with the tension of conducting this work within a society of inequality.”
Special thanks to Dr. Marisa Franco for arranging this visit and presentation!
The Psychosocial Development of African American Students with Dr. Kevin Cokley
Resilience and Liberation at the Intersection: Building a Research Agenda with Trans People of Color with Dr. Anneliese Singh
Challenges and Resilience Speaker Series
View photos from this Speaker Series on the topic of Challenges and Resilience. Talks within this topic included: Play Therapy with Terminally Ill Children, Pathogenesis to Salutogenesis: Understanding Health, Recovery, & Subjective Well-Being Among Adult Survivors of Childhood Trauma, & Stress generating & Stress enhancing Effects of Perfectionism on STEM students.
Positive Psychology Speaker Series
View photos from the Speaker Series on the topic of Positive Psychology. Talks within this topic included: The Heart of Hope Study, The Heart of Forgiveness-Seeking after Humble Repentance, Decisional forgiveness, Virtues and Meaning in Life: How Doing Good Might Contribute to the Good Life, Psychology for Ministry: Clergy Attitudes Toward Mental Health.
The Psychology of Working Theory with Dr. Ryan Duffy
View photos from the Speaker Series presentation by Dr. Ryan Duffy on The Psychology of Working Theory.
Culturally Adapted Interventions with Drs. Jamie Aten and Melanie Brewster
View photos from the Speaker Series presentations by Aten and Brewster on Culturally Adapted Interventions.
Speaker: Dr. Stephanie Y. Evans, Professor and Director, Institute for Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Georgia State University
Title: “Black Women’s Yoga Memoirs Before and After 1975: An Intellectual History of Inner Peace, Self-Care, and Stress”
Summary from Dr. Evans:
Dr. Stephanie Evans will discuss one question: How have African American women elders written about managing traumatic stress? Six yoga memoirs by women over age seventy punctuate African American history by emphasizing how holistic health practices have been present in women’s narratives since at least the mid-nineteenth century. Primary sources mention meditation and yoga from eras of enslavement, segregation, and migration to the Civil Rights, Black Power, and New Age movements. To date, Black women have written over fifty yoga memoirs that show how meditation, exercise, movement, stretching, visualization, and chanting promote wellbeing. This work reveals how Black women’s memoir is a prime location from which to study mental health history before and after 1975 when yoga was solidified as a national phenomenon. Evans posits inner peace as a journey, self-care practices (like yoga) as vehicles on that journey, and stress as events that inhibit our movement toward peace.
Memoirs by Harriet Jacobs, Sadie and Bessie Delany, Eartha Kitt, Rosa Parks, Jan Willis, and Tina Turner reveal Black women’s everyday holistic health practices that address stress, anxiety, and depression. Professor Evans engages Anna Julia Cooper’s concept of regeneration for a three-part reflection: look inward for strength to unpack her own experience, look back at historical memoirs for wisdom, and look forward with hope to the next generation of wellness workers. In addition to senior portraits and mid-life sketches, dozens of additional memoirs by yoginis (women yoga practitioners) are highlighted to reveal several generations of self-healers and wellness activists at a moment when Black women’s studies is approaching its fiftieth anniversary.
For more information, contact Ken Rice at [email protected].
What We Do
The purpose of the Ken Matheny Center for the Study of Stress, Trauma, and Resilience at Georgia State University is to facilitate multidisciplinary approaches to produce compelling models for understanding and coping with stress that can be applied to real-world settings.
Stress and trauma affect physical, mental and occupational functioning, and can have adverse effects on health and health-related outcomes. Increasingly, the debilitating effects of stress and trauma are being recognized by the helping professions and drawn to the attention of the public. Given the pervasiveness of stress, trauma and its effects, efforts to understand and manage these experiences should embrace collaborative, multidisciplinary approaches that build on existing strengths and resources.
Course Work
This undergraduate, online course covers several topics related to stress and how to manage stress. For example, the course covers different types of psychological stress and the major sources of stress in daily living, the ways our bodies react to stress, and how stress relates to a variety of psychological and physical factors.
This course is an elective within the program Human Learning and Development B.I.S.
CPS 3600 Positive Psychology: Not Just Happiness, but Pursuit of a Meaningful Life
The course provides an overview of theory and empirical research on human strengths, flourishing, and well-being. The major topics to be covered include: (1) measurement and classification of human strengths; (2) the roles of environment, development, and culture in psychological functioning; (3) the neurobiology of human strengths; (4) the physical and mental health benefits of human strengths; and (5) how positive psychology can inform prevention and intervention efforts in schools and the workplace. Students will also engage in weekly experiential activities designed to deepen their understanding of positive psychology constructs (e.g., gratitude, altruism) and facilitate personal development.
This course is an elective within the program Human Learning and Development B.I.S.
CPS 8500 Stress Management
This graduate course has been offered online and in person. The course covers approaches to studying psychological stress and its effects, major sources of stress, physiology of the stress response, connections between stress and a wide range of psychological and physical variables, and effective coping for stress management.
News Stories & Workshops
Monitoring local and national news about COVID-19 and following the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s recommendations for preventing infection can take a toll. So Jeff Ashby, professor and co-director of the College of Education & Human Development’s Center for the Study of Stress, Trauma and Resilience, has eight tips for people managing stress in the face of shelter-in-place orders and social distancing.
On May 12-13, we held our first Multicultural Orientation Conference: Engaging Cultural Humility, Comfort and Opportunities in Therapy, the Classroom, Research and Beyond. Featured speakers included Drs. Kimber Shelton, Evelyn Hunter, Jesse Owen and Cirleen DeBlaere. We look forward to making this an annual event.
Left Behind Series: What Happens When People Leave Religion (or Reconstruct Their Relationship with the Sacred)?
The center held a series of talks on Oct. 23.
Daryl Van Tongeren, associate professor of psychology at Hope College and the director of the Frost Center for Social Science Research, gave a presentation entitled, “Religious Dones: The Science of Religious Deidentification.” Preston Hill, assistant professor of integrative theology at Richmont Graduate University and director of the Doctor of Ministry program, gave a presentation entitled, “Posttraumatic Spiritual Yearning: Religious Dones in Theological Context.”
Both presentations are part of the center’s “Left Behind Series: What Happens When People Leave Religion (or Reconstruct Their Relationship with the Sacred)?” The series focuses on the recent work in counseling psychology to incorporate a cultural adaption of interventions for religious nones or non-believers, which might include atheists, agnostics or people who identify as spiritual but not religious.
Contact Us
Contact the Ken Matheny Center for the Study of Stress, Trauma, and Resilience
at [email protected].