Amy Kerivan Marks, PhD

Assistant Professor 
Director of Undergraduate and Graduate Studies
Department of Psychology

Phone: 617.573.8017
Fax: 617.367.2924
Email: akmarks@suffolk.edu
Office: Donahue Building, Rm. 609

Education

• PhD, Brown University
• BA, Cornell University

Specialty Areas

Developmental Psychology (Social & Emotional), At-Risk Youth, Diversity, Culture & Acculturation, Mixed Methods and Statistics.

My research aims to better understand the ways in which ecological settings promote or inhibit a variety of developmental processes across childhood and adolescence. Put simply, I am interested in exploring person-context interactions in normal and abnormal development. This work typically takes a positive youth development perspective, as well as an interest in the unique characteristics of settings that increase risk for poor health and education outcomes, particularly among ethnic and racial minority youth. Much of my recent work has focused on the unique ways immigration contexts interact with children and families to shape development.

In a new book this year, my collaborators and I present an empirical exploration of the “immigrant paradox” - a population phenomenon in which more highly acculturated youth have worse health, behavioral and education outcomes than recently immigrated peers. This book is the culmination of a 4-year grant examining risk outcomes among immigrant adolescents in nationally-representative studies. Students in my lab are currently studying patterns of depression, obesity and sexual risk behaviors by immigrant generation, as well as studying ethnic and sexual identity development in adolescence and emerging adulthood. As part of a collaboration with Prof. Coyne, students in my lab are also studying how acculturation impacts early childhood development in a low-income Chinese American community. Inspired by the complexity of these topics, I take a “mixed methods” approach to my research (e.g., combining correlational, qualitative, experimental, and data modeling studies), and draw from ecological and minority youth development theoretical frameworks.

Selected Publications

Garcia Coll, C., & Marks, A. K. (In Press). The Immigrant Paradox in Children and Adolescents: Is becoming American a developmental risk? Washington DC: American Psychological Association.

Marks, A. K., Patton, F., & Garcia Coll, C. (2011) Being Bicultural: A mixed-methods study of adolescents’ implicitly and explicitly measured multiethnic identities. Developmental Psychology, 47(1), 270-288. PDF

García Coll, C., & Marks, A. K. (2009). Immigrant stories: Ethnicity and academics in middle childhood. New York: Oxford University Press.

Marks, A. K., Szalacha, L. S., Lamarre, M. Boyd, M. J., & García Coll, C. (2007). Emerging ethnic identity and interethnic group social preferences in middle childhood: Findings from the Children of Immigrants Development in Context (CIDC) study. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 31(5), 501-513.

Marks, A. K., & García Coll, C. (2007). Psychological and demographic correlates of early academic skill development among American Indian and Alaska Native youth: A growth modeling study. Developmental Psychology, 43(3), 663-674.

Courses Taught

PSYCH 215 - Behavioral Statistics
PSYCH 334 - Adolescent Development
PSYCH 428 - Psychology Honors Seminar
PSYCH 723 - Multivariate Statistics
PSYCH 734 - Multicultural Perspectives on Development