Lab Members
Lab Director: Evan Kleiman, Ph.D.
Evan Kleiman is an Associate Professor of Psychology at Rutgers University, with a secondary appointment in the Department of Health Behavior, Society, and Policy in the School of Public Health. Prior to coming to Rutgers, Dr. Kleiman was a Postdoctoral Fellow (2014-2017) and Research Associate at Harvard University. He received his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at George Mason University (2014), completed his clinical psychology internship at Temple University (2014), and received his BA in Psychology from Temple University (2008).
Dr. Kleiman’s work focuses on understanding the everyday occurrence of factors of interest to clinical psychological scientists. He has a specific focus on the everyday lives of individuals at risk for suicide using smartphone and wearable monitoring technology. His work has been published in over 140 peer-reviewed manuscripts and is currently funded by several NIMH grants. | CV | Research Gate | Google Scholar
Postdoctoral Research Fellows
Elizabeth Edershile
Elizabeth Edershile (Betsy) is a postdoctoral research associate who joined the lab in summer 2023. Betsy is interested in better capturing and understanding interpersonal and affective dynamic patterns that give rise to expressions of psychopathology. For example, some of her work has explored the affective and interpersonal processes associated with narcissistic symptom expression. She is also interested in understanding how affective variability associates with risk for suicide. Betsy leverages multiple techniques in her research, including ecological momentary assessment and experimental methods.
Mariah Hawes-Souza
Mariah joined the lab in Fall 2023 as a psychology intern in the Rutgers UBHC doctoral internship program. She stepped into her current role as a postdoctoral associate upon graduating from Stony Brook University with a Ph.D. in clinical psychology in Fall 2024. Mariah’s research broadly focuses on dynamic transdiagnostic processes central to psychopathology that are the primary targets of treatment (e.g., emotion dysregulation). In addition to research, Mariah is involved in the development of group programming for inpatient care at Rutgers UBHC, provides clinical supervision to psychology doctoral students, and sees patients in the New Brunswick Outpatient clinic.
Thomas O'Kane
Thomas (Tom) O’Kane is a postdoctoral research associate who joined the lab in Fall 2024, having received his PhD in clinical psychology. Dr. O’Kane’s research interests include the psychosis-spectrum, as well as health behaviors and the integration of psychological services within medical settings. | CV |
Clinical Psychology Residents
Gavin Rackoff
Gavin is a psychology resident at Rutgers University Behavioral Health Care, working with the lab for his research and minor clinical rotations. His research focuses on utilization and outcomes from traditional and technology-assisted mental health care services. He completed his graduate coursework and dissertation research at The Pennsylvania State University.
Graduate Students
Kai Kellerman
Kai is a sixth-year graduate student in the clinical psychology program. His primary research interests focus on proximal suicide risk factors and the cognitive mechanisms by which they contribute to increases in suicidal thoughts over short time frames. Additionally, he is interested in the development of suicide risk factors among vulnerable adolescent populations, including sexual and gender minority youth.
Annabelle Mournet
Annabelle is a fourth-year graduate student in the clinical psychology program. Her primary research interests focus on the use of ecological momentary assessment to investigate suicide risk and protective factors (e.g., social connection, sleep) among autistic adults. | CV |
Ellen Wittler
Ellen is a third-year graduate student in the clinical psychology program.
Roscoe Garner
Roscoe is a second-year graduate student in the clinical psychology program. His primary research interests focus on the use of technology-based interventions for suicide risk among adults, specifically mechanisms of change within these interventions. Additionally, he is interested in investigating why certain individuals experience suicidal ideation, while others go on to ultimately attempt suicide.
Molly Ball
Molly is a first-year graduate student in the clinical psychology program. Her primary research interests focus on optimizing real-time mobile interventions for individuals at high risk for suicide. Additionally, she is interested in the use of mobile tools to predict and improve social-support seeking and disclosure behaviors in moments of elevated risk for suicide.
Research Coordinators
Hannah Krall
Hannah received her B.A. in Psychology from Skidmore College and after graduating, served as a Research Assistant in the Cognition, Emotion, and Life Experiences (CEL) lab at Butler Hospital/Brown University. Her research interests include identifying risk factors for suicidal ideation/behavior, mobile intervention (i.e., EMI, JITAI), and application of DBT for life threatening behaviors. Hannah hopes to pursue her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology.
Emma Yoon
Emma received her B.S. in Psychology and Sociology from the University of Pittsburgh in 2024. Her research interests focus on the structural and individual factors influencing mental health outcomes and stigma in racial and ethnic minority communities. She is particularly interested in using EMA and psychophysiological methods to study mental health in real-time. Emma aims to pursue a Ph.D. in Clinical or Counseling Psychology.
Undergraduate RAs
Allison Pereira
Allison is a senior at Rutgers University working as an undergraduate research assistant in the Kleiman Lab
Lab Alumni
Jeremy Grove (Post Doc) – Assistant Professor in Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Duke University
April Yeager (Project Coordinator) – Clinical Psychology PsyD Student at Rutgers University
Madison Taylor (Project Coordinator) – Clinical Psychology PhD Student at The University of California – Irvine
Olivia Lozy (Project Coordinator) – Brand Program Manager at X (Twitter)
Kaileigh Conti (Project Coordinator) – Applied Development Science PhD Student at Colorado State University
Dana Steinberg (Project Coordinator) – Clinical Psychology PhD Student at SUNY Binghamton
Lab Collaborators
Kate Bentley – Massachusetts General Hospital
Paul Duberstein – Rutgers University
Cassie Glenn – Old Dominion University
Jessica Hamilton – Rutgers University
Richard Liu – Massachusetts General Hospital
Matthew Nock – Harvard University
Shireen Rizvi – Rutgers University