Clinical Research Postdoctoral Fellow - Kids Neurodevelopment (KiND) Lab

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A Brief Overview
Under the direction/guidance of a mentor (principal investigator), assumes responsibility for a specific, on-going research project. The experience will serve to extend, refine and enhance skills necessary for professional and career development, and will enable the individual to broaden his/her scientific background by acquiring new research capabilities. It is expected that this individual will conduct independent scholarly research, and will contribute directly to the overall research goals of the project and the research group.

This role will be expected to participate in project planning, recording and interpretation/evaluation of data, and communication of results. This position will also be expected to acquire technical, lab management, and manuscript/grant writing skills; and participate in seminars, lectures, poster sessions and presentations at national meetings. This role also may be required to supervise junior lab members, develop new methods and protocols for research, and assist with the development of other research projects in the lab.

About the Laboratory

The Kids NeuroDevelopment (KiND) Laboratory in the Lifespan Brain Institute at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and the University of Pennsylvania, led by Dr. Lauren K. White, seeks a Postdoctoral Scholar to work on a Wellcome Trust-funded project examining intergenerational mechanisms of anxiety risk.

The project, RAISE-AI: Resilience Across Intergenerational Stresses and Emotional Health through AI-Enabled Discovery, investigates how anxiety-related signals are transmitted from parents to children during naturalistic interactions. The project is particularly focused on understanding how parental stress, anxiety, behavior, physiology, and emotional communication shape children's emerging emotional responses and developmental trajectories of risk and resilience.

RAISE-AI integrates clinical and developmental science with high-resolution multimodal methods, including parent-child behavioral observations, speech and language, prosody, facial affect, posture, and autonomic physiology, including heart rate variability and respiratory sinus arrhythmia. The resulting dataset provides a unique opportunity to examine moment-to-moment dynamics of parent-child emotional communication and to advance understanding of how anxiety risk unfolds across generations.

The postdoctoral scholar will help lead the clinical, developmental, and/or dyadic components of the project, with opportunities to contribute to study design, behavioral coding and phenotyping, psychophysiological analysis, clinical and developmental interpretation of multimodal signals, and scientific dissemination.

Depending on the scholar's interests and background, work on the project may incorporate techniques such as:

* Developmental and clinical assessment of anxiety, emotion regulation, and parent-child functioning
* Leading observational coding and analysis of parent-child interactions
* Dyadic and moment-to-moment modeling of emotional communication
* Psychophysiological analyses, including HRV/RSA and parent-child physiological synchrony
* Longitudinal and developmental statistical modeling
* Collaboration with computational researchers using speech/language analysis, computer vision, machine learning, and generative AI approaches

A PhD in clinical psychology, developmental psychology, developmental psychopathology, affective neuroscience, psychology, neuroscience, or a related field is required by the appointment date. Strong candidates will have interests in child development, pediatric anxiety, parent-child relationships, developmental psychopathology, psychophysiology, or intergenerational transmission of risk and resilience. Candidates with experience in clinical assessment, parent-child observational methods, developmental psychophysiology, dyadic data analysis, or longitudinal modeling are especially encouraged to apply.

The project provides a rare opportunity to work with large-scale, high-resolution multimodal data from parent-child interactions, including behavioral, physiological, audio, video, and language-based measures. The scholar will have opportunities to lead clinical and developmental papers, contribute to interdisciplinary publications, develop independent research questions, and build expertise in cutting-edge approaches to studying emotion, psychopathology, and family processes.

The postdoctoral scholar will primarily be responsible for leading clinically and developmentally focused analyses, contributing to the interpretation of multimodal and psychophysiological data, and preparing scientific papers and conference presentations. Additional responsibilities may include collaboration with research staff and trainees, involvement in clinical or behavioral phenotyping, oversight of dyadic interaction data, and contribution to ongoing KiND Lab research activities. The fellow will receive close mentorship from Dr. White and collaborators across institutions, with opportunities to develop independent research projects and interdisciplinary collaborations.

Position qualifications include strong quantitative and scientific writing skills, experience with clinical, developmental, behavioral, physiological, or longitudinal data, the ability to work independently and collaboratively on interdisciplinary projects, and an interest in parent-child processes and developmental mechanisms of anxiety risk. Experience with R, Python, or related analytic tools is preferred but not required for candidates with strong clinical/developmental expertise and a clear interest in developing these skills.

The start date is flexible, with a preferred start between April and early fall 2026. Review of applications will begin immediately and continue until the position is filled.

Please visit https://www.thekindlab.org/ and https://www.research.chop.edu/kind-lab

What you will do

• Conduct independent scholarly research and develop new methods and protocols
• Participate in project planning, recording and evaluation of data
• Acquire technical, lab management and grant writing skills
• Participate in seminars, lectures, poster sessions and presentation at national meetings
• Supervise junior lab members
• Assist with other research projects

Education Qualifications

• Doctorate Required

Skills and Abilities

• Ability to wear a respirator device

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SALARY RANGE:

Salary ranges are shown for full-time jobs. If you're working part-time, your pay will be adjusted accordingly.

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