Infant & Child Mental Health Certificate Program Faculty

Offered by the Brown Center for the Study of Children at Risk, The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, Women & Infants Hospital, and Brown University Office of Continuing Education

Dr. Linda LaGasse is Assistant Professor (Research) in the Department of Pediatrics and the Director of Research of the Brown Center for the Study of Infants at Risk at Brown Medical School and Women & Infants Hospital. Dr. LaGasse is particularly interested in the effects of prenatal exposure to drugs of abuse on development including early infant cry, cognitive-motor processes like goal directed reaching, later behavior problems and psychopathology. Currently her primary focus is two multi-site, longitudinal studies of children with prenatal exposure to methamphetamine and adolescents with prenatal exposure to cocaine. She is also PI of an international study in New Zealand extending her work on prenatal methamphetamine exposure and child outcome. Dr. LaGasse has over 35 peer reviewed publications and chapters, serves as advisor to other multi-site studies, ad hoc grant reviewer for several NIH institutes. Her research is supported by NIH grants for the past 15 years.

Barry M. Lester, Ph.D. is Professor of Psychiatry & Human Behavior and Professor of Pediatrics at the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University. He founded and directs the Brown Center for the Study of Children at Risk at the Brown Alpert Medical School and Women and Infants Hospital. The Brown Center provides research and clinical services for infants at risk and their families as well as research and clinical training. Dr. Lester received his Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology from Michigan State University in 1973 and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. He studies the interplay between biological and environmental forces that drive development in at risk and typically developing children. His research has been supported by the NIH for over 30 years. Dr. Lester is a past member of multiple NIH study sections and a past member of the National Advisory Council on Drug Abuse at NIDA. He is also past president of the International Association for Infant Mental Health and the author of more than 200 scientific publications and 16 books.

Dr. Cynthia Miller-Loncar is the Director of Clinical Services for the Brown Center for the Study of Children at Risk and a licensed psychologist. Her clinical areas of focus are differential diagnosis of early childhood behavioral and developmental disorders as well as relational-centered parenting interventions for early childhood problems. Her research examines the impact of parenting on child development, with a focus on the development of interventions that enhance child outcomes in at-risk populations. Populations of interest include preterm infants, infants with early regulatory problems, and children with drug-exposure histories. Additional research interests include the relation of psychobiology and social development in children and the interrelation among family functioning and early regulatory problems such as infant colic.