Research Samples

Project: Creating a resource guide for the Pennsylvania State University on best practices for inclusive teaching and research

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    1. Conducting literature review assessing the field and identification of relevant research

    2. Analyzing key findings to draft report containing guidance and recommendations for inclusivity

    3. Utilizing the guide to conduct trainings to better serve gender and sexually diverse populations

  • Gender and sexually diverse students have better physical, mental, and emotional outcomes in college when institutions foreground validating and respecting diversity.

    While institutions may understand the importance of DEIB/JEDI initiatives, using collated empirical data to both craft a narrative and provide instruction creates not only shared knowledge about why inclusivity is crucial to organizational success; it creates a call to action answerable by using the guide itself.

    1. During introductory meetings, asking people to disclose pronouns can be one way to set an expectation of awareness for one’s peers. However, it is critical to follow up and remind everyone involved to honor everyone’s pronouns, with the instructor acting as a moderator when needed.

    2. When designing research projects involving demographic questions, only including “male/female” is not only thoughtless, it will also result in reductive data! Using “select all that apply” with a wide array of options, a two-step approach, and the ability to write in answers, are all ways to have more inclusive design that will also get more insightful, nuanced data.

Project: Designing and conducting a multi-year project exploring the relationship among identity formation, media technologies, and culture among gender and sexually diverse Amish, German Baptist Brethren, and Mennonites

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    1. Designed study and submitted all materials to IRB for approval

    2. Conducted a literature review and analyzed research from multiple academic disciplines, blogs, and social media content

    3. Designed a semi-structured interview guide and conducted ten 1–3 hour in-depth interviews

    4. Analyzed all data and created an intensive report outlining findings, concerns, and recommendations

  • For separatist ethnoreligious populations, discussions about identity can be contradictory, confusing, and traumatic. Media, whether analog or digital, can play a large role in creating spaces where it is safe to explore, form, and think through one’s own identity.

    For young people in closed communities who may be queer and/or transgender, and are made to feel that these identities are sinful, shameful, and evil, information communication technologies may be an avenue for play, hope, and community.

    1. Fundamentalist closed communities may conflate sex, gender, and sexuality into rigid systems where deviating from normative behaviors is met with multifaceted punishment

    2. Exposure to queer and/or trans culture through media, such as music or influencers, can help individuals feel less cognitive dissonance, distress, and loneliness

    3. It is crucial to not paint these communities as inherently cisheteronormative simply because they are Plain communities; queer and/or trans people exist in any culture and should not be erased

Project: Designing and leading end-to-end project for a major pharmaceutical company conducting cognitive interviews with cancer patients and carepartners, reviewing a symptom tracking application in development

Project involves proprietary information, as such, some details are redacted

    1. Utilized client brainstorming ideas to create a semi-structured interview guide

    2. Conducted 30 1–hour in-depth interviews

    3. Using thematic analysis and objective metrics, coded responses to determine discrete commonalities

    4. Created a visual slide deck report visualizing findings and action items based on participant feedback

  • Pharmaeutical companies and medtech are excited about creating new offerings for patients and careprtners to track symptoms and side effects. Logging this information can be useful when talking to one’s healthcare team, tracking overall health, or navigating brain fog. However, not every team consults the patients who will be using these apps!

    It is invaluable to adopt a patient-centric approach to make sure the app design, content, and interface are set up in a way that motivates users to download and regularly engage.

    1. Users appreciate design with bold typefont and high-contrast colors

    2. For chemotherapy patients, being mindful of neuropathy and the ability to engage with the phone in a tactile way: think about more than just the option to click on a button!

    3. Users would be motivated to track symptoms via an app, and think it can be a helpful tool for carepartners as well as one’s healthcare team, to stay informed and attentive to trends