Research

MH2: Mobile Health for Mental Health

Mobile Health for Mental Health, MH2™, is a web-based application that optimizes early stimulant medication treatment for children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) through improving communication between the parent, teacher, and prescriber.

Our UCLA HSS team developed the app and pilot-tested it at two Los Angeles community mental health clinics that serve predominantly low-income children and families.

Role: Project coordinator & data analyst. Conducted and supervised data collection & research design, coordinated with technical team, supervised research assistants and trainees. Conducted data analysis and writeup.

Project PI: Bonnie Zima, UCLA Center for Health Services and Society.

MHSA (Mental Health Services Act) Outcome Measure Project: Reporting on Outcome Measures that Matter for Communities

(Contracted by the California Mental Health Services Oversight and Accountability Commission)

Project to identify gather, develop, and disseminate key metrics of the seven negative domains of mental health challenges and unmet needs listed in the California Mental Health Services Act.

Role: Created a community partner advisory board. Networked with partner organizations. Developed and carried out a qualitative study component consisting of interviews, focus groups, and public engagement observations. Collaborated in writing and editing public reports and data fact sheets. Served as interim project manager during the early stages of the project.

Project PIs: Sheryl Kataoka and Bonnie Zima, UCLA Center for Health Services and Society.

Quality Evaluation of the Mental Health Services Act in Los Angeles

(Contracted by the Los Angeles County Dept of Mental Health)

External evaluation of LA county's MHSA-funded projects for quality improvement. Final report available here.

Role: Data collection & data analysis. Conducted open-ended phone interviews with adult patients enrolled in Full Service Partnership (FSP) programs in Los Angeles.

Project PIs: Nicole Eberhart, RAND; Sheryl Kataoka, UCLA Center for Health Services and Society.

Comparison of Standardized Measures for Tracking Child Mental Health Outcomes

(Contracted by the California Department of Health Care Services

A multistage study to develop recommendations for child mental health measures to be used for California’s Outcomes Measurement and Quality Improvement System.

Role: Researcher. Conducted a literature scan and synthesis of peer-reviewed validity and reliability tests of existing standardized outcome measures for child mental health care. Qualitative discourse analysis of Delphi panel discussion to supplement quantitative rankings.

Project PI: Nadireh Pourat, UCLA Center for Health Policy Research.

Creativity and Identity in Mothers' Online Craft Vending

Examination of time management, creative expression and identity among U.S. mothers and female heads of household who sell artwork or handicrafts over the internet. This project examines two main themes: 1) the motivations behind internet vending, including whether/how it is useful as a way of supplementing household income and 2) how individuals balance their time among their diverse roles as mothers, businesswomen and creative artists, and build public and private identities based around these roles.

I focused specifically on artists and craftswomen in order to investigate how creative skill, talent and personal interest become driving forces in addition to economic need, and how they factor into the construction of public (in this case online) identity.

Research was conducted from 2013 to 2015 while a Research Scholar with the UCLA Center for the Study of Women, and consisted of interviews with vendors and content analyses of public webpages.

Family Home Businesses and Child Socialization into Economic Morality (Dissertation)

My dissertation research examined in-home stores in San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico, examining economic strategizing and child socialization. I focus on three main themes:

• mothers’ use of economic diversification strategies, balancing multiple small-scale economic activities (of which the store forms one focal example) along with housework, child-care, and children’s (and sometimes their own) schooling;
• the salience of local and long-distance family and neighbor networks as a support structure for such a strategy as well as how such relationships are instantiated in the linguistic structure of store transactions;
• and children’s socialization through everyday language into relevant skills and cognition as well as moral attitudes toward economic activities.

Research was conducted from 2007 to 2009, consisting of video and audio recorded observations of daily interactions with focal families, and interviews with mothers and other family members.

Doctoral Committee: Elinor Ochs, Marjorie Goodwin, Yunxiang Yan, Patricia Greenfield.

Zinacantec Youth: Gossip and Social Change (Master's Thesis)

My MA research examined the co-construction of moral judgments and social norms among adolescent peers. Research was conducted from 2004 to 2006 in the town of Nabenchauk, a Zinacantec Maya community in the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico. I examined the use of assessments (specifically, judgments about the behavior of others) in the casual conversation of a group of female cousins in their late teens and early twenties. Focus was on on how participants construct logical arguments whose premises include unstated social expecations and on how such arguments serve as socializing tools among peers in a changing society.

MA Thesis Committee: Elinor Ochs, Marjorie Goodwin, Patricia Greenfield.