The Self and Relationships research team is a graduate student-centered group. My main goal as the team leader is to facilitate students’ career objectives and research projects in addition to collaborating on my projects. Although each student in the group has her own individual goals, an implicit aim of our group is to form a cohesive research team, working together to learn more about how to do scientific research on relationships from beginning to end. We learn about the process of developing ideas and theoretical formulations, deriving clear hypotheses, translating hypotheses into methods, collecting data, analyzing the results, and creating a clear, cogent report for publication. However, the research process involves more than learning the formal steps of each research study. Through our meetings, we become more aware that the relationships between team members are a part of the research process, helping to bring our science to life.
Linda Acitelli, Ph.D.,
Associate Professor and Director