About the Contributors
They're the brainiacs... they help us with things.
Julianne Ludlam is a clinical psychologist working as an assistant teaching professor at the University of Missouri - Columbia, Department of Psychological Sciences.
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Dr. Ludlam earned her B.A. in Psychology from Grinnell College, her M.Ed. in Human Development and Psychology from Harvard University and her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Alliant International University. Working alongside Dr. Philip Cushman, her dissertation entitled "The Double-edged Sword of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder" explored the history of trauma diagnoses in the United States.
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Today, Dr. Luldam teaches courses in the clinical science division of the Department of Psychological Sciences, including General Psychology, Abnormal Psychology and the Clinical Psychology capstone.
Aaron Sawyer is a program manager at Engility Corporation in Austin, Texas.
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Dr. Sawyer earned his B.S. in Psychology from Denison University, his M.S. in General/Experimental Psychology at Western Washington University and his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Missouri-Columbia. His dissertation, titled "Evaluating the Long-Term Impact of Youth Interventions on Antisocial Behavior" explores child psychopathology, a research interest he maintained throughout his doctoral studies in so far as he even designed two courses in social development and clinical abnormality concerning children and adolescents at the university.
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Today, Dr. Sawyer focuses on PTSD, providing insight and leadership focused on developing and applying a generalizable, research-based knowledge translation model to the military health system.
Nicole Cronk is a ​clinical psychologist working as an associate teaching professor at the University of Missouri - Columbia, School of Medicine.
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Dr. Cronk earned her B.A. in Psychology from Harvard University, her M.A. in Psychological Studies at Seton Hall University and her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Missouri-Columbia. Her dissertation, titled "Causes of Comorbidity Among Internalizing Disorders of Childhood and Adolescence: The Roles of Neuroticism, Genes and Environment" was a stepping stone that paved the way for her to enter the field of health psychology - a growing subsection of clinical psychology.
Today, Dr. Cronk's research focuses on the etiology and treatment of anxiety and depression, smoking correlates and treatment, and motivational interviewing. She also teaches courses in family medicine.
Libby Cowgill is a biological anthropologist working as an associate professor at the University of Missouri - Columbia, Department of Anthropology.
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Dr. Cowgill earned her B.A. in Anthropology from the University of California - Berkeley before moving to Missouri to earn her M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in Anthropology from Washington University. Her dissertation, titled "The Ontogeny of Late Pleistocene Human Postcranial Robusticity" was completed under the guidance of Dr. Erik Trinkaus as a means of studying the human fossil record and the evolutionary changes made throughout the Pleistocene epoch (the last major period of glaciation in our history).
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Today, Dr. Cowgill's research focuses on many areas in the study of human evolution, including human growth and development, human skeletal variation and functional morphology. Specifically, she is interested in exploring the relationship between childhood activity patterns and the impact of those patterns on adult skeletal morphology.