Our lab focuses on:
Sex-and-gender specific patterns of response to different stressors
Learning and emotional processing with relationship to sex steroids
Stress, trauma, and sex/gender across development
Neurendocrine and behavioral substrates of posttraumatic reactions among women
Sex-and-gender specific patterns of response to different stressors
Different stressors have been shown to have a sex/gender-specific effect on stress response. Our lab aims to disentangle biologically driven, sex dependent processes and psychosocially driven, gender dependent processes, underlying these sex/gender-specific effects.
Currently, we are conducting a fully online study examining gendered risk and resilience factors - for participation, follow this link.
Learning and emotional processing with relationship to sex steroids
One of the promising avenues of inquiry into the role of sex as a biological variable in stress response is the relationship between sex steroids (estrogen, progesterone and testosterone) and emotional processing. Our laboratory examines this using endocrine measures and behavioral tasks exploring such processes as fear learning, extinction, and generalization, and emotional regulation.
Currently, a Binational Science Fund (BSF) funded study is underway examining the relationship between natural fluctuation in estrogen, neural function, and fear overgeneralization among trauma-exposed women. The study is being conducted at the University of Haifa Neuroimaging Unit at the Rambam Health Care Campus, and is in collaboration with Prof. Yuval Neria, head of the PTSD and Trauma program at Columbia Psychiatry and the New York State Psychiatric Institute.
If you are interested in participating - please follow this link.
Neurendocrine and behavioral substrates of posttraumatic reactions among women
Posttraumatic responses are characterized by behavioral, cognitive and emotional substrates, but also involve complex interactions between biological systems. In particular, neural function in response to stress is strongly related to endocrine response. Our lab explores the specific way in which endocrine and neural systems interact with behavioral ones among females, addressing sex as a biological variable in the study of posttraumatic responses, resilience and recovery.
Stress, Trauma and sex/gender, across development
Stress related disorders (depression, anxiety, PTSD) a show a gender disparity, with higher prevalence among women, particularly in the years between menarche and menopause. The relationship to both sex steroids (biological factor) and roles women fulfill during these years (psychosocial factors) begs a multi-pronged, developmental model. Our lab thus investigates the relationship between stress, trauma, and developmental transitions such as puberty, pregnancy, parenting, and peri-menopause.