Department of Psychology

Clinical Graduate Program in Psychology - Research Training in Pediatric Psychology

Students in our program come from undergraduate schools that represent all areas of the country and share an interest in child health and pediatric psychology. Most students have worked in research positions in pediatric psychology or related areas prior to graduate school. Students' research interests encompass a broad range of topics (see topics of recent master's and dissertation research). To find out more about the current students enrolled in the pediatric psychology training program, please click here.

Given the highly specialized nature of our program, we are most interested in students who have a strong career interest in pediatric and/or child health psychology. We are looking for students who want to pursue academic as opposed to primarily clinical careers in medical or graduate schools. Many of our prospective students are interested in integrating research and clinical care in pediatric settings. However, given the emphasis of our program and the training grant requirements, our focus in primarily on training the next generation of researchers and scholars in the field of pediatric psychology and in selecting students whose potential is consistent with this mission. In this regard, we are interested in the depth and extensiveness of students' research and clinical experiences with pediatric populations and scholarly potential based on recommendations, presentations, and participation, peer reviewed publications. Our program also emphasizes student initiative in developing their research, so we prefer “self starters” who have an agenda they want to follow.

Finally, although our students have ambition and initiative, our program emphasizes peer collaboration and cooperation rather than competition. In this spirit, we are interested in “team players” who work well with their peers and medical colleagues.

In keeping with the theme of facilitating early career and leadership development, students in our program are given opportunities and are encouraged to contact and connect with behavioral pediatricians and pediatric psychologists in our setting and others. Such contact occurs through participation in collaborative research and clinical care throughout the program, through student presentations at regional and national scientific meetings, by meeting with nationally recognized scholars who visit our campus, and by opportunities to plan and implement scientific conferences.

Students typically attend and where possible, present, at two professional meetings a year: either the regional or national pediatric/child health psychology meetings and the meetings of the Society for Behavioral and Developmental Pediatrics, including the workshop in clinical hypnosis at this meeting. Moreover, students have an opportunity to meet visiting behavioral pediatricians and pediatric psychologists such as Anne Kazak, Grayson Holmbeck and Ron Brown, who have been lecturers at recent pediatric psychology lectures. Students have been very involved in planning recent conferences at Case on quality of life assessment, adherence to treatment in childhood chronic illness, and technological innovations in clinical care and research with children, and in the publications generated from these meetings.

The program has been funded by the National Institute of Mental Health for 21 consecutive years, and is the only pediatric psychology program in the U.S.A. to achieve such a record. A description of our program was selected to be published in Professional Psychology Research and Practice in 1998 (Vol. 29, pp. 402-404) in a section on innovations in training and in the Journal of Pediatric Psychology in 2003 (Vol. 28, 123-135). Finally, our program has been consistently cited in various descriptions of training in pediatric psychology as a model program.

• Efficacy of intervention to improve parent-physician communication in primary care


• Diabetes-related decision making autonomy and relationship to diabetes-related conflict and adherence to treatment


• Effects of written emotional disclosure on caregivers of children and adolescents with chronic illness


• Outcome expectancy and self-efficacy in adolescent asthma self-management


• Efficacy of play intervention to promote adjustment in school age children


• Self-identified goals and well being in young adults with a chronic illness


• Psychological adaptation to muscular dystrophy


• Family responsibilities for asthma management tasks in inner-city African-American adolescents


• Health beliefs and adherence to treatment in adolescents with chronic illness


• Efficacy of problem-solving intervention for children and adolescents with asthma


• Health beliefs, exercise, and diet among adolescents with histories of congenital heart disease


• Predictors of functional outcome in traumatic brain injury


• Social support and adherence to treatment in juvenile diabetes


• Adherence to treatment in young children with sickle cell disease

Victoria Miller (Email: Victoria.Miller@case.edu)
Year in Program: Completed program in 2004, Currently on internship at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
Clinical Placement: N/A
Research Interests: Decision-making autonomy in children and adolescents with chronic illness; ethical issues in pediatrics (e.g. informed consent and assent; children's participation in medical decision-making)
Representative Publications/Presentations:

• Miller, V.A., Drotar, D., Burant, C., & Kodish, E. (In press). Clinician-parent communication during informed consent for pediatric leukemia trials. Journal of Pediatric Psychology.
• Feeny , N.C. & Miller, V.A. (2004). Borderline personality disorder and treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder among female assault victims. Directions in Mental Health Counseling, 14, 1-9.
• Miller, V.A. & Feeny, N.C. (2003). Modification of cognitive-behavioral techniques in the treatment of a five-year old girl with social phobia. Journal of Contemporary Psychotherapy, 33(4), 303-319.
• Miller, V.A. & Drotar, D. (2003). Discrepancies between mother and adolescent perceptions of diabetes-related decision making autonomy and their relationship to diabetes-related conflict and adherence to treatment. Journal of Pediatric Psychology, 28(4), 265-274.
• Miller, V.A., Palermo, T., Powers, S., Scher, M., & Hershey, A. (2003). Migraine headaches and sleep disturbances in children. Headache, 43(4), 362-368.
• Miller, V.A., Palermo, T., & Grewe, S. (2003). Quality of life in pediatric epilepsy: Demographic and disease-related predictors and comparison with healthy controls. Epilepsy & Behavior, 4, 36-42.

Lisa Schwartz (Email: Lisa.Schwartz@case.edu)
Year in Program: Completed program in 2004, Currently on internship at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
Clinical Placement: N/A
Research Interests: coping with pediatric chronic illness; quality of life; risk and resiliency in childhood
Representative Publications/Presentations:

• Schwartz, L., & Drotar, D. (in press). Linguistic analysis of written narratives of caregivers of children and adolescents with chronic illness: Cognitive and emotional processes and physical and psychological health outcomes. Journal of Clinical Psychology in Medical Settings.
• Schwartz, L., & Drotar, D. (2004). Effects of written disclosure on caregivers of children and adolescents with chronic illness. Journal of Pediatric Psychology, 29, 105-118.
• Palermo, T., Schwartz, L., Drotar, D., McGowan, K. (2002). Health-related quality of life in children with sickle cell disease. Journal of Behavioral Medicine.
• Palermo, T.M., Schwartz, L., Drotar, D., & McGowan, K. (2002). Parental report of health-related quality of life in children with sickle cell disease. Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 25, 269-283.
• Schwartz, L., Taylor, G., Drotar, D., Yeates, K. O., Wade, S. L., Stancin, T. (in press). Long-term behavior problems following pediatric traumatic brain injury: Prevalence, predictors, & correlates. Journal of Pediatric Psychology.

Kathy Zebracki (Email: Kathy.Zebracki@case.edu)
Year in Program: 5th
Clinical Placement: Rainbow Babies and Children's Hospital
Research Interests: health-related quality of life, functional disability, and pain in children and adolescents with chronic conditions; parent-child discrepancies regarding illness characteristics
Representative Publications/Presentations:

• Zebracki, K., Palermo, T., Hostoffer, R., Drotar, D., & Duff, K. (in press). Health-related quality of life of children with primary immunodeficiency: A comparison to children with a chronic health condition and to health controls. Annals of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology
• Zebracki, K. & Drotar, D. (2004). Outcome expectancy and self-efficacy in adolescent asthma self-management. Children’s Health Care, 33(2), 133-149.
• Zebracki, K., Drotar, D., Kirchner, H.L., Schluchter, M., Redline, S., Kerscmar, C.M., & Walders, N. (2003). Predicting attrition in a pediatric asthma intervention study. Journal of Pediatric Psychology, 28, 519-528.
• Palermo, T., Zebracki, K., Newman, A., & Singer, N. (2003, March). Juvenile Chronic Arthritis: Predictors of Parent-Child Discrepancy on Reports of Pain, Disability, and Quality of Life. Poster session at Pediatric Rheumatology 2003: Park City and Beyond, Park City, UT.
• Zebracki, K. & Drotar, D. (2003, August). Outcome Expectancy and Self-Efficacy in Adolescent Asthma Self-Management. Poster session at the 2003 Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association (APA), Toronto, Canada.

• Moore, M., Taylor, H.G., Minich, N., Hack, M., & Klein, N.(under review) Longitudinal changes in family outcomes of very low birth weight.
• Moore, M., & Russ, S. (2004, August). Long term effects of pretend play training on play, creativity, and emotional processes in children. Poster presented at the annual conference of the American Psychological Association, Honolulu, HI.
• Moore, M., Taylor, H.G., & Minich, N. (2004, April). Long changes in family outcomes of very low birth weight. Poster presented at the Child Behavioral Health Conference, Charleston, SC.
• Moore, M., Taylor, H.G. and Minich, N. (2003). Longitudinal Changes in Family Sequelae of Very Low Birth Weight. Poster presented at the Research Showcase, CWRU.

• Palermo , T., Witherspoon, D., Valenzuela, D., & Drotar, D. (2004). Development and validation of the child activity limitations interview: A measure of pain-related functional impairment in school-age children and adolescents. Pain , 109 , 461-470.
• Witherspoon, D., Palermo , T., Cant, C., Valenzuela, D. & Drotar, D. (2003). Validation of the Child Activity Limitations Interview: A measure of functional disability. Poster presented at the International Symposium on Pediatric Pain, Australia.

• Kohler, C., & Johnson, C.E. (in press). Neurosyphilis and psychosis. In S.H. Fatemi (Ed.), Neuropsychiatric disorders and infection. London : Martin Dunitz & Parthenon Publishing.
• Johnson, C.E., Moelter, S.T., Ford, S., Tombaugh, T., & Moberg, P.J. (October 2002). Response consistency on the test of memory malingering. Poster presented at the National Academy of Neuropsychology Conference, Miami, FL.
• Johnson, C.E., Taylor, H.G., & Minich, N. (July 2004). Predictors of school age outcomes in very low birth weight children. Poster and presentation at the American Psychological Association Annual Convention, Honolulu, HI.

• Lewandowski, A., Cant Peterson, K., Kiska, R., Palermo, T. (April 2004). Interactions between age, gender and depression in predicting functional disability in recurrent headache sample. Poster session presented at the annual meeting of the Society for Pediatric Psychology, Charleston, SC.