GWU Clinical Psychology PhD program

04/07/2026

Last week, Madison Newell presented her 2nd year project, "Environmental and Heritable Pathways to Socioemotional Outcomes: The Roles of Child Positive Affectivity & Household Chaos.” Thanks to Madi for sharing these unexpected and intriguing results with us!

03/26/2026

Congratulations to Alana Rule on successfully defending her dissertation entitled: Black Girlhood is Sacred yet Stolen: Construction and Validation of a New Measure of Gendered Racial Microaggressions for Black Adolescent Girls

03/04/2026

This afternoon, Clinical Psychology doctoral students, Alana Rule and Vicky Ho, were inducted into the GWU chapter of prestigious Bouchet Graduate Honor Society, which recognizes outstanding scholarly achievement and promotes diversity and excellence in doctoral education and the professoriate. Vicky and Alana both spoke eloquently about their research, which exemplifies the the five Bouchet qualities of scholarship, leadership, character, service, and advocacy. Congratulations to you both on this remarkable achievement!

02/28/2026

The Clinical program congratulates Anese Barnett, Vicky Ho, and David Kalwicz on their successful internship matches for next academic year.

Anese - West Virginia University's Behavioral Medicine & Psychiatry, Martinsburg, WV
Vicky - Mount Sinai Hospital/Adolescent Health Center, NY, NY
David - Nemours Children's Health, Wilmington DE

This is a huge milestone in their journey to completing the Clinical Psychology PhD! Congratulations to all!

02/28/2026

Congratulations to Clinical psychology graduate student, Blakely Murphy, on a splendid dissertation defense of her dissertation — The Power of Appraisals: Perceived Stress and Perceived Threat as Parallel Mediators Between COVID-19 Stressful Events and College Students’ Mental Health.

Blakely is currently completing her Clinical Psychology Internship at the Center for Counseling and Student Development, The University of Delaware.

Blakely's defense committee included: Cindy Rohrbeck (Dissertation Director), Phil Wirtz and Nick Talisman (Committee), Risa Broudy and Lex Pulice-Farrow (Muhlenberg College) (Readers). Phil Moore chaired the defense meeting.

02/17/2026

Congratulations to clinical psychology doctoral students Vicky Ho, David Kalwicz, and Alana Rule on their new article!

Ho, V.C., Kalwicz, D.A., Rule, A.C., and Gee, C. (2026). COVID-19 stress, social support, and loneliness during the transition to in-person learning. Curr Psychol 45, 508. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-025-09002-4.

David and Vicky were co-first authors on this paper. The authors would like extend a special thanks to Dr. Ellen Yeung for statistical consultation!
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12144-025-09002-4

In light of college campus COVID-19 policies limiting social contact, this study examined the role of COVID-19 perceived stress (CPS), social support from various sources, and negative social exchange (NSE) on loneliness in college students (N = 111) during the transition to in-person learning. ...

02/14/2026

Congratulations to Clinical Psychology Ph.D. program students, Vicky Ho and Alana Rule, who both have been inducted to The George Washington University chapter of the Edward Alexander Bouchet Graduate Honor Society.

The GW's Bouchet Society Recognition Ceremony will be held on Tuesday, March 3, 2026, from 3:30 p.m. to 5:00 pm in the Science & Engineering Hall, room B1220.

This is an incredibly prestigious award for both Vicky and Alana, recognizing their outstanding academic achievements!

02/02/2026

It was great to welcome students and faculty back to our Spring Clinical Colloquium series with Clinical psychology doctoral student Inna Goncearenco's presentation of her second-year research project titled: “Self-disgust and its relationship with conformity to masculine and feminine norms and suicidal ideation in the LGBTQ+ populations.” Thanks, for sharing this very interesting study, Inna!

12/09/2025

Today’s speaker for our last Clinical Colloquium presentation this Fall was clinical psychology doctoral student Saskia Jorgensen, who will be presenting her second-year research project: “Exploring identity-related behaviors in LGBTQ+ people: Associations with identity centrality, pride, and community connectedness.”

It was a very interesting presentation that helped us feel some positivity as we head towards winter break! Great job, Saskia!

12/02/2025

Today's speaker in the Clinical Colloquium Series was clinical psychology doctoral student Lauryn Hoard, who presented her second-year research project titled “Navigating online racial discrimination: A mixed methods study of protective factors among black college students.”

Thanks for sharing this interesting and ambitious study with us!

11/20/2025

Please join us in congratulating, Clinical PhD student, Maya Cook Alford, on successfully defending her dissertation, “Black Parenting Power: A Qualitative Study Examining Coparental Racial Socialization Practices in Black Families.” Maya has accepted a postdoc position at Westchester Jewish Community Services (where she completed her APA-accredited internship). In this position, she will continue training in trauma-focused interventions and will serve as project evaluator for their Certified Community Behavioral Health Center grant.

Her committee included: Drs. Christina Gee (Dissertation Director), Sherry Molock, Lionel Howard, Jody Ganiban, and Jameta Barlow.

Congratulations, Maya!

11/18/2025

The Meltzer Center is providing outreach to our community on Thursday and Friday -- please stop by if you can!