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Armen B

- Research Program Mentor

PhD candidate at Duke University

Expertise

Clinical (i.e., abnormal) psychology, child psychology, developmental psychopathology, cognitive development, research methods, basic statistics (e.g., ANOVA, regression)

Bio

Armen’s area of study is developmental psychopathology. He uses behavioral and neuroimaging methodologies (e.g., fMRI, EEG) to understand how psychobiological vulnerabilities and environmental risk factors shape developmental processes and pathways of normative and atypical cognitive, social, and emotional development during early childhood. Armen is a clinician-in-training, and works with individuals - both children and adults - with various psychiatric conditions such as depression, anxiety, chronic pain, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) . Armen grew up in a low-income family in Philadelphia and was the first in his family to go to college. He loves to cook, check out restaurants, and travel. You might find him at your local coffee shop in Durham, North Carolina.

Project ideas

Project ideas are meant to help inspire student thinking about their own project. Students are in the driver seat of their research and are free to use any or none of the ideas shared by their mentors.

Writing a Research Grant Proposal

Students will write a research grant proposal to convince the reader that: 1) their research project has clear objectives, 2) their research project is worth doing, 3) their proposed methods are suitable and feasible, and 4) there is a well thought out plan for achieving the objectives in the available time frame.

Learning to Communicate Science Effectively

Students will choose a published manuscript and 1) summarize its results to a lay audience in a news-style article, 2) design a graphical abstract as a visual summary, and/or 3) create a short video summarizing the main findings.

Literature Review: Does the brain’s response to errors associate with symptoms of anxiety?

Electroencephalography (EEG) and functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) can measure how the human brain responds to errors during inhibitory control tasks. Does the brain’s response to errors associate with symptoms of anxiety disorders? Students will conduct a literature review to synthesize results demonstrating this relationship. This is just one example of a research question for a literature review. You can conduct a literature review on any topic you would like. We will work together to craft an idea. You can submit your final product to a preprint server and become a published author!

Literature Review: How has the COVID-19 pandemic affected mental health?

Students will conduct a literature review to synthesize results demonstrating whether the COVID-19 pandemic has decreased psychological well-being (i.e., increased levels of depression, anxiety, etc.). This is just one example of a research question for a literature review. You can conduct a literature review on any topic you would like. We will work together to craft an idea. You can submit your final product to a preprint server and become a published author!

Coding skills

Proficiency in R

Languages I know

Russian (Native speaker)

Teaching experience

I have served as a teaching assistant four times for various psychology courses. I have mentored students in various capacities including for an organization that supports low-income and first-generation college students.

Credentials

Work experience

Yale University (2018 - 2020)
Research Fellow in Clinical Neruoscience

Education

University of Pennsylvania (UPenn)
BA Bachelor of Arts (2018)
Psychology
Duke University
PhD Doctor of Philosophy candidate
Clinical Psychology

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