Gender and the Transition to Parenthood: Understanding the A, B, C's

Kristin D. Mickelson is Professor of Psychology at Arizona State University in the School for Social and Behavioral Sciences. She received her Ph.D. in Social Psychology from Carnegie Mellon University in 1995 and completed her post-doctoral training at the Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan and the Department of Health Care Policy, Harvard School of Medicine. Dr. Mickelson's research is interdisciplinary, with special emphases on social and health psychology. She utilizes both sociological and psychological literature to inform her research questions. Dr. Mickelson's scholarly work examines the role of stressors and psychosocial factors on relationship functioning and health. She has investigated how various dimensions of stressors affect social support processes, as well as the role of contextual factors such as socioeconomic status on the stress-social support-health relationship. Her current research focuses on two main areas: 1) gender differences in the risk and protective factors for postpartum distress in couples making the transition to parenthood and 2) the role of discrimination and resilience on racial/ethnic disparities in low birthweight. Dr. Mickelson's research has been widely cited and she has published in a variety of journals, including the Journal of Marriage and Family, Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Sex Roles, Social Science and Medicine, and Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

Kristen Marcussen is a Professor of Sociology at Kent State University. Dr. Marcussen's two primary lines of research link self and identity processes to mental health and well-being. Her research on role-identities and well-being examines the social psychological processes that underlie the relationship between family roles and mental health with a focus on how differences in social support, coping resources, and relationship quality explain marital status differences in distress. She also explores how discrepancies between self-appraisals and the perceived appraisals of others impact self-esteem and psychological well-being in the context of these identities. Dr. Marcussen's second area of research focuses on stigma processes that underlie and undermine well-being among individuals with serious mental illness. Her current work integrates identity and stigma theories to develop measures of mental illness identity and examine the role of stigma resistance in identity processes. Dr. Marcussen's work has been funded by the National Science Foundation and appears in journals such the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Social Psychology Quarterly, and Society and Mental Health.