Lauren Alvis, PhD
Lauren is based in Houston, Texas. She works under Julie Kaplow, Executive Director of The Trauma and Grief Center.
Lauren is a Lifespan Developmental Psychologist and Applied Quantitative Statistician who specializes in understanding how to promote the health and well-being of racially marginalized youth. Using an asset-based approach, Lauren’s research aims to support resilience and positive adaptation in youth facing adversity, reduce mental health disparities, and increase access to data-informed, culturally responsive care, particularly for youth of color who have experienced trauma and/or bereavement. An important aspect of this work involves the careful consideration of potential mechanisms that contribute to racial inequities, such as structural racism and racial trauma, as well as mitigating factors that promote thriving among youth of color.
In her role at the TAG Center, Lauren provides conceptual, methodological, and statistical oversight over all TAG Center research studies, including ongoing research in the domains of racial trauma and cultural adaptations of evidence-based treatments for youth exposed to trauma and loss. She also oversees data infrastructure innovation, which involves creating and maintaining streamlined relational databases and managing shared data repositories to support TAG Center’s nationwide implementation and dissemination of trauma- and grief-informed best practices. In addition, Lauren works closely with TAG’s Senior Director of Data Analytics on data dashboard development and implementation, program evaluation, and grant writing.
Lauren earned her BA in Psychology at the University of Alabama and her master’s and PhD in Life-span Developmental Psychology, with an emphasis on advanced quantitative analyses, from West Virginia University. She completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Trauma and Grief Center at Texas Children’s Hospital/Baylor College of Medicine and served as a Quantitative Research Associate at the Institute for Research on Youth Thriving and Evaluation (RYTE) at Montclair State University.
