Marci Hall, an Undergraduate student of Dr. Caroline Richter’s course on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (PY 415, Spring 2023) created this infographic as part of her Master of Public Health internship with The Exceptional Foundation. During this course, as part of the service-learning component, students were required to volunteer at the Exceptional Foundation. The infographic discusses the rights of children with intellectual and developmental disabilities and some policies that support them in school and within the Birmingham community.

Marci Hall also created these slides to foster conversation with the members of the Exceptional Foundation about exercise, nutrition, and friendships. You can have access to the full set of slides here.

Our lab members attended and presented at the 2023 Association for Psychological Science (APS), in Washington, D.C.

Heard, M. R., Hawrych, R. C., Ennis, R., Mrug, S. & Richter, C. G. (2023, May). Risk and protective factors of life satisfaction in early adolescence. Poster presented at the 2023 Association for Psychological Science Annual Convention, Washington, DC.

Richter, C. G., Li, C.*, Chen, J. M., Hoeft, F. (2023, May). Emotional well-being in middle-schoolers with specific learning disabilities. Data Blitz Presentation; Mechanisms Underlying Mind-Body Interventions & Measurement of Emotional Well-Being (M3EWB) Research Summit, Washington, DC.

Koslouski, J., Hall, S., Chafouleas, S., Wittenberg, E., Fabiano, G., & Richter, C. G. (2023, May). What about us?: Reviewing the Current Landscape of Emotional Well-Being Measures for Historically Overlooked Populations. Symposium presented at the 2023 Association for Psychological Science Annual Convention, Washington, DC.

Our lab members presented at the Spring 2023 UAB Undergraduate Research Expo and Ost Research Competition in the Department of Psychology:

Hawrych, R. C. & Richter, C. G. (2023, April). Executive function measurement schemas and performance patterns in children and adolescents with intellectual disability. Poster presented at UAB Expo.

Dahlman, A.*, Arnold, H. P., Mervis, C. B., Richter, C. G. (2023, April). The role of persistence in adaptive functioning and school readiness for children with Williams syndrome ages 6 – 8 years. Poster presented at Ost Research Competition, Psychology Department, UAB.

Our lab members attended and presented at the 55th Gatlinburg Conference on Research and Theory in Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, in Kansas City, MO.

Richter, C. G., Hillock, M. L., Becerra, A. M., Guimarães, V. N, Williams, C. J.*, & Mervis, C. B. (2023, April). Mastery motivation in young children with Williams syndrome or Down syndrome. Poster presented at the Gatlinburg Conference on Research and Theory in Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, Kansas City, KS.

Our lab members presented at the Fall 2022 UAB Undergraduate Research Expo:

Dahlman, A.*, Richter, C. G., Siegelman, N., Mahaffy, K., Bunt, M. van den, Kearns, D. M., Landi, N., Sabatini, J., Pugh, K., & Hoeft, F. (2022, November). The impact of computer-assisted technology on literacy acquisition during COVID-19-related school closures: Group-level effects and predictors of individual-level outcomes. Poster presented at UAB Expo.

• Alison Dahlman was the 2^nd Place Winner of the in-person Fall Expo 2022 in the Social and Behavioral Science category.    

Redden, K. B.*, Coffey, L.*, Richter, C. G. (2022, November). Stereotype and stigma interventions and future avenues in individuals with specific learning disabilities. Poster presented at UAB Expo.

Reading, Literacy & Learning Annual International Dyslexia Association (IDA) Conference (San Antonio, TX)

Dr. Caroline G. Richter chaired a symposium at Reading, Literacy & Learning Annual International Dyslexia Association (IDA) Conference, San Antonio, TX in November 2022. The symposium was about Socio-emotional challenges in learning disorders. Dr. Fumiko Hoeft, Dr. Robert Hendren, Dr. Stephanie Al Otaiba, and Rebecca Kockler were part of the symposium. Dr. Richter’s presented a paper on Stigma and Stereotype Threat for Individuals with Specific Learning Disabilities. See her presentation here.

During her talk, Dr. Richter discussed how individuals with specific learning disabilities (SLD) experience more negative socioemotional outcomes than their peers, including lower self-esteem and increased mental health problems. Academic and socioemotional adjustment difficulties can persist into adulthood if left unaddressed. Two potential contributors to these less optimal socio-emotional outcomes include stigma and stereotype threat. Stigma is characterized by negative beliefs about an individual based on a certain characteristic. SLD diagnosis is stigmatizing, considering the labels disorder and disability that can imply some level of inherent weakness. Stereotype threat is a more constricted construct, that relates to a specific situation in which an individual fears confirming those negative beliefs. The results of this systematic review demonstrated that individuals with SLD are vulnerable to stigmatization. In addition, having greater SLD stigma is associated with having lower self-esteem and less optimal psychological adjustment, including greater anxiety and depression, lower academic performance, lower adaptive coping, lower self-efficacy, lower quality of life, and lower school belonging.