Douglas M. Teti

Biography:

Dr. Douglas Teti is a developmental scientist whose research is focused on family processes as they relate to infant and early child development. He has had a long-standing interest in socio-emotional development in early childhood (e.g., quality of attachment to parents), parenting competence and parenting at risk, how parenting is affected by parental mental health and contextual factors, and how parenting affects infant and child functioning. During the past ten years he has received continuous funding from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development to examine the role of parenting in promoting/impeding child sleep in infancy and early childhood, and how parenting and sleep intersect in predicting child development and family functioning.  All of his current projects are interdisciplinary and involve graduate and undergraduate students.  His students draw from the project they work on in developing their own areas of expertise. In addition, Dr. Teti serves as a co-leading faculty member (along with Rina Eiden) of the Families at Risk (FAR) research initiative of the Child Study Center.  FAR brings together a working group of faculty across Penn State interested in factors that influence family processes (parenting, marital relations and coparenting, sibling relations) and family well-being, and in turn how these processes affect and are affected by children’s development.