Clare Mehta | Faculty | Emmanuel College Boston

Assistant Professor of Psychology

Contact Information

617 975 9362

mehtac@emmanuel.edu

Office Hours

Office: Administration Building, Room 421-A

Office hours: By appointment

Publications + Presentations

Mehta, C.M., Keener, E., & Shrier, L. A. (in press). Women's experiences of graduate school in the US and the UK: An interpretative phenomenological investigation. Gender and Education.
Mehta, C.M., Walls, C., Blood, E., & Shrier, L.A. (In press).The context of youth sexual desire: Does company and location matter? Journal of Sex Research.
Sunner. L. E., Walls, C., Blood, E.A., Mehta, C.M., Feldman, H., & Shrier, L. (In press). Collecting Data on Sex Events from Both Partners in Young Couples. Journal of Sex Research.
Mehta, C.M., Sunner, L.A., Head, S., Crosby, R., & Shrier, L. (2011). "Sex is not something you do with someone you don't care about": Adolescent girls' definitions of sex. Journal of Adolescent and Pediatric Gynecology.
Mehta, C.M., & Strough, J. (2010) Gender-typing and gender segregation in adolescence. Sex Roles, 63, 251-263.
Mehta, C.M., & Strough, J. (2009). Sex segregation in friendships and normative developmental contexts across the lifespan. Developmental Review, 29, 201-220.
Strough, J., Mehta, C.M., McFall, J., & Schuller, K. (2008). Do older and younger adults make different decisions about sunk costs? Psychological Sciences,19,650-652.
Doppler, E.E., Harkins, D., & Mehta, C.M. (2008) Emerging empowerment: Conflict resolution intervention and preschool teachers' reports of conflict behavior. Early Childhood Education and Development, 19, 885-906.

Research Focus

Broadly defined, Dr. Mehta's research interests are related to how sex (biological characteristics of a person related to reproduction), gender (culturally socialized characteristics believed to be appropriate for males and females; Unger, 1979), and related social processes (e.g., sex segregation), influence adolescents' and young adults' beliefs and behaviors. Based on these interests, Dr. Mehta investigates the correlates and consequences of sex segregation (the tendency to spend time with same-sex peers; Mehta & Strough, 2009; Mehta & Strough, 2010), including the influence of gender roles socialized in same sex peer groups, on sexual activity (Mehta, Sunner, Head, Crosby & Shrier, 2011; Sunner, Walls, Mehta, Blood & Shrier, 2012) and substance use.

 Dr. Mehta's research is guided by two complimentary theoretical perspectives: (1) a lifespan theoretical perspective, which contends that development occurs across the lifespan within a larger socio-historical context, and (2) a social-constructivist model of gender development that contends that gender-typed characteristics are best understood as created and maintained by the transaction of the individual and the immediate context (Deaux & Major, 1987). Dr. Mehta uses both quantitative and qualitative methodology to answer research questions, and intend to continue to develop an expertise in both approaches.

In addition to being an Assistant Professor in the psychology department at Emmanuel College, Boston, Dr. Mehta is also a staff scientist at Boston Children's Hospital, and a fellow in pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Mehta leads the lifespan lab at Emmanuel College.

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Assistant Professor of Psychology

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