Chrystyna D. Kouros
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Ph.D., University of Notre Dame, 2008

TEL 214.768.2655
EMAIL ckouros (add @smu.edu to all email addresses)
OFFICE 310C Hyer Hall
CURRICULUM VITAE click to view

My research focuses on understanding individual differences in depressive symptoms and depression in the context of family stress, and involves two inter-related programs of research. One line of research examines the etiology, maintenance, and progression of child and adolescent depression. Specific research aims examine how individual symptoms of depression change over time and predict later diagnoses, sex differences in symptom trajectories and the structure of depression, and the role of children’s responses to family stressors—at the physiological, emotional, and behavioral levels—in their symptom trajectories. Among family stressors, I have a particular interest in children’s exposure to everyday marital conflict and parental psychopathology. A second line of research examines the interplay between relationship functioning (e.g., conflict, satisfaction) and depressive symptoms in married and dating couples. This includes examining the mechanisms by which relationship functioning and mental health are dynamically related.

Kouros, C. D. , Quasem, S. L, & Garber, J. (in press). Dynamic temporal relations between anxious and depressive symptoms across adolescence. Development and Psychopathology.

Kouros, C. D., & Cummings, E. M. (2011). Transactional relations between marital functioning and spouses’ depressive symptoms. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 81, 128-138.

Kouros, C. D., & Garber, J. (2010). Dynamic associations between mothers’ depressive symptoms and children’s depressive and externalizing symptoms. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 38, 1069-1081.

Kouros, C. D., Cummings, E. M., & Davies, P. T. (2010). Early trajectories of interparental conflict and externalizing problems as predictors of social competence in preadolescence. Development and Psychopathology, 22, 527-538 .

Papp, L. M., Kouros, C. D., & Cummings, E. M. (2010). Emotions in marital conflict interactions: Empathic accuracy, assumed similarity, and the moderating context of depression . Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 27, 367-387.

Kouros, C. D., & Cummings, E. M. (2010). Longitudinal associations between husbands’ and wives’ depressive symptoms. Journal of Marriage and Family, 72, 135-147.

El-Sheikh, M., Kouros, C. D., Erath, S., Cummings, E. M., Keller, P. S., & Elmore-Staton, L. (2009). Marital conflict and children’s externalizing behavior: Interactions between parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous system activity. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development , 74, 1-101.

Papp, L. M., Kouros, C. D., & Cummings, E. M. (2009). Demand/withdraw patterns in marital conflict in the home. Personal Relationships, 16, 285-300.

Kouros, C. D., Papp, L. M., & Cummings, E. M. (2008) Interrelations and moderators of longitudinal links between marital satisfaction and depressive symptoms among couples in established relationships. Journal of Family Psychology, 22, 667-677.

Kouros, C. D., Merrilees, C. E., & Cummings, E. M. (2008). Marital conflict and children’s emotional security in the context of parental depression. Journal of Marriage and Family, 70, 684-697.