Children and Families Lab

During the first years of life, infants are forming social relationships, particularly with their parents. These parent-child interactions in the first year are considered to have a significant impact on developmental outcomes, such as emotion regulation. Early parent-child interactions can also be influenced by other factors in the family, such as the marital relationship, as well as characteristics of children and parents.

The Children and Families Lab is an infant social and emotional development lab that utilizes longitudinal designs and multiple methods (e.g., parent-report, experimenter-report, observational coding, etc.). Families come into our lab located on WKU's main campus in Gary A. Ransdell Hall to participate in our studies.

We research why some children are better than others at regulating their emotions. Specifically, we examine how individual differences in children (e.g., temperament) and parent characteristics (e.g., parenting & the marital relationship) contribute to the development of adaptive regulatory abilities and aspects of the parent-child relationship. We are also interested in the role of the father in his child's development, something that is less studied than the role of the mother. In particular, our research focuses on examining the similarities and differences between father-infant and mother-infant dynamics.

If you are interested in gaining research experience in the Children and Families Lab, are interested in participating in one of our studies, or would like more information please contact Dr. Lickenbrock at diane.lickenbrock@wku.edu.