Giving Voice UTM
Research Team
Graduate and Undergraduate
Student Researchers

Benji jacob
Benji Jacob (he/him) is a third-year undergraduate specializing in psychology and minoring in biomedical communication at the University of Toronto Mississauga. He is a Laidlaw Scholar and the Lab Coordinator at the Chung Lab. He is interested in using intersectional frameworks to investigate personality and identity development of QT-BIPOC students.

hania amir
Hania Amir (she/her) recently graduated from the University of Toronto, Mississauga with a specialist in forensic psychology, and is currently working with the Chung Lab through the UTEA program. She is interested in social determinants of health in relation to culture, migration, and racialized populations. Her hobbies include graphic design and videogames.

Jawahir Mohamed
Jawahir Mohamed (she/her) recently graduated from the University of Toronto Mississauga with a psychology specialist and a biology minor. She has been in the Chung Lab since May 2022, and will be starting her PhD at the lab this Fall. Jawahir is passionate about using a community-oriented and social justice-focused approach in her research, exploring how social context shapes the personality, identity development and well-being of individuals with intersecting identities.

Stella Zhang
Stella Zhang (she/her) is a first-year Ph.D. student in the Chung Lab. She is interested in using a narrative approach to understand how shifts in cultural context through processes such as immigration and displacement impact the development of people's identity, personality, and well-being. Specifically, she is interested in understanding how people narrate key events in their life (e.g., migration journey, engagement with new social structures), how their personal stories relate to broader master narratives, and how narration facilitates the integration of these experiences into their identity. She is excited to collaborate with people from immigrant and refugee communities in the GTA to do this work.

Marim Adel
Marim Adel (she/her) is a first-year Ph.D. in the Chung Lab. Their research interests include personality and identity development, radical hope, relationships, and land education. More specifically, Marim is interested in understanding how ethnic, sexual, and gender identity may motivate people to self-expansion and how relationships may contribute to this process. She appreciates working within an intentional and collaborative space. Her hobbies include reading, crochet, and gardening.

Zaiyuan hu
Zaiyuan Hu (she/her) is a second-year a second-year Ph.D. student in the Chung Lab. She is interested in studying how changes in racialized emerging adults' personality expression in daily life led to changes in their personality traits in the long term. She is passionate about examining her research questions using various quantitative and qualitative methodologies. During her free time, she enjoys exploring restaurants, bookstores, and vintage shops in Toronto and spending time with her cat.
Principal Investigators

kelci harris
Kelci Harris (she/her) is co-director of Giving Voice and Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Victoria. Kelci is trained in social/personality psychology and has extensive experience conducting research with university students, including a longitudinal study of people’s relationships and personality development in university. She has expertise in personality development, advanced statistical techniques, and longitudinal methods. In her research, Kelci focuses on friendships, specifically how do friendships affect people, how do people affect their friendships and what do friendships look like. Kelci is especially skilled in study design, data analysis, manuscript writing, and knowledge mobilization to broader audiences, including invited presentations at flagship conferences.

joanne mee hae chung
Joanne Mee Hae Chung (she/her) is co-director of Giving Voice and Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Toronto Mississauga. Joanne uses mixed methods to examine emotions and personality development in emerging adulthood. Dr. Chung received training in social/personality psychology with an emphasis on approaches for considering culture and advanced quantitative methods. Since then, she has implemented several longitudinal studies that incorporate narrative and daily life methods. Joanne advocates for using open science practices in longitudinal work and work that focuses on underrepresented people. She has used community-based participatory research methods to broaden the impact of her work and to benefit participant communities, and regularly applies her arts background to use creative media for scientific communication.

ruth alemayehu
Ruth Alemayehu (she/her) is a Neuroscience Specialist and Biology for Health Sciences Major and will graduate with her HBSc from the University of Toronto Mississauga this spring. She is deeply committed to supporting and creating accessible events for underrepresented students, evident in her various roles such as Co-President for UTM Black Students' Association, the Racialized Students' Coordinator at the UTMSU, Black Access to Educational Excellence (BAEE) Ambassador, student/peer mentor, and now in her current role as VP Equity at the UTMSU.

Jennifer danahy
Jennifer Danahy (she/her) is the Supervisor of Pre-Arrival Engagement at the University of Toronto Mississauga's Centre for Student Engagement. In this role, she spearheads initiatives to support new students, overseeing programming, orientation efforts, team development, and academic program planning.

kwame diko
Kwame Diko (he/him) provides solutions for complex culture, engagement, recruitment, admissions and access initiatives within education. He also welcomes and responds to challenges with focus, skill and creative solutions to achieve operational excellence.

Jerry Flores
Jerry Flores (he/him) serves as an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at University of Toronto Mississauga, also affiliated with the Sociology tri-campus graduate department at the University of Toronto-St. George. His interdisciplinary research delves into the intersections of institutions such as and law enforcement and schools, exploring their collective influence on the experiences of at-risk Latinas and Indigenous women and girls across North America.

Hema
Ganapathy-Coleman
Hema Ganapathy-Coleman (she/her) is an Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto Mississauga, specializing in developmental and cultural psychology. Her current research project focuses on exploring various aspects of cultural maintenance, cultural hybridity, and participation in Canadian society within the Asian Indian diaspora in the Greater Toronto Area.

kamadchi karunanandan
Kamadchi Karunanandan (she/her) has worked in Student Affairs at the UTM Residence for nearly 8 years. She finds immense satisfaction in connecting with racialized students to identify individualized support plans that work best for them. In addition to her work with students, Kamadchi is passionate about fostering community and promoting a sense of connection within the residence.

marigrace noronha
Marigrace Noronha (she/her) is the Undergraduate Examinations Coordinator at University of Toronto Mississauga. She also has a background in providing comprehensive support within the psychology department, namely assisting academic advisers and faculty with undergraduate technician duties, coordinating first-year psychology test assignments, and fostering communication between students, staff, and faculty.

David Pereira
David Pereira (he/they) serves as the Acting Director of the Sexual & Gender Diversity Office at the University of Toronto. Their research employs an intersectional and queer theoretical framework, prioritizing the voices of students and young people to critically examine and unveil systemic discrimination and inequities within educational systems.

vi phan
Vi Phan (she/her) is a registered social worker with a certificate in diversity, equity and inclusion from Cornell University and a Master of Social Work from the University of Toronto. She has been practicing for over a decade as a social worker, providing direct service and policy system change work. Her passion and experience in the field has focused on increasing access and providing destigmatizing mental health services along with a focus on advancing equity, inclusion and diversity efforts to ensure compassionate, trauma-informed and person-centered care.

Simone Walker
Simone Walker (she/her) is a Sessional Lecturer at the University of Toronto Mississauga, specializing in social and personality psychology. In particular, topics such as well-being, emotion and relationships.
Advisory Board
