Excellence in Research

Dr. Miller is a Senior Research Scientist in the Center for Postsecondary Research at Indiana University Bloomington. She holds a PhD in educational psychology from Ball State University. Her primary responsibilities include conducting research and data analysis for the National Survey of Student Engagement, with a focus on developing, cleaning, and reporting data for topical modules, consortia, and experimental items. She also serves as a Senior Scholar for the Strategic National Arts Alumni Project and as an Associate Editor for Gifted Child Quarterly. Her research interests include the utilization of creativity in educational settings, factors impacting gifted student engagement and achievement, high-impact practices in higher education, survey methodology, and arts education.

Social Stress in Honors College Students: How Personality Traits, Perfectionism, Creativity, and Gender Predict Use of Social Coping Strategies

SENG Journal: Exploring the Psychology of Giftedness, March 2022

Abstract: Much research has focused on how gifted children and adolescents deal with the social stigmas associated with giftedness. Previous studies indicate that several coping strategies exist, and these are related to personality and other characteristics. However, once these gifted individuals enter higher education, they are often required to shift their coping strategies to deal with stressors and situations in this new environment. This study investigates social coping strategies among honors college undergraduate students, looking at the need for updating the factor structure of a measure of social coping designed for and used with middle and high school students. Results suggest some variation in strategies for the honors college students. Additional results explore how personality traits, creativity, perfectionism, and other demographic characteristics predict the use of certain social coping strategies. This information can be used to mitigate the experience of social stress for this unique student population and address their needs through a supportive and accommodating environment.

Noreen is a doctoral student in the Quantitative Methods Program at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University. Her research interests focus on best practices in education, supporting underserved populations, and ensuring access to developmentally appropriate educational opportunities based on empirically documented best practices for meeting the learning needs of all students regardless of their ZIP code. Noreen is a Research Assistant at the Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth, where she enjoys developing longitudinal studies on facilitating positive development, broadly defined. In addition to her research and scholarly work, Noreen is an instructor with Vanderbilt’s Programs for Talented Youth; she teaches Exploratory and Graphical Data Analysis and Quantitative Methods.

In Their Own Voice: Educational Perspectives From Intellectually Precocious Youth as Adults
Gifted Child Quarterly, accepted September 2024

Co-authors David Lubinski and Camilla P. Benbow

Abstract: Educational acceleration is well established as a best practice for meeting the learning needs of precocious youth. It occupies one region of a broader spectrum of interventions designed to align educational curricula with students’ learning readiness, namely, appropriate developmental placement. Despite over 100 years of robust longitudinal support, educational acceleration is not reliably implemented in practice or educational theorizing. This investigation extends this literature through a mixed-methods approach of the educational experiences and perspectives of intellectually precocious youths as adults. Study 1 examines the experiences and views of gifted (N = 1,279) and highly gifted (N = 479) individuals in their mid-30s on homogenous grouping for instruction. Study 2 constitutes a constructive replication of Study 1 involving an unobtrusive generalization probe, administered to profoundly gifted participants (N = 241) and top STEM doctoral students (N = 695) in their mid-20s. Study 2 focuses on participants’ high school likes and dislikes to determine whether they unobtrusively capture sentiments indicative of appropriate developmental placement in general and educational acceleration in particular. Collectively, participants appear to crave advanced and challenging educational material. Across cohorts and genders, a longitudinal examination of potential moderators revealed that these results did not covary with lifestyle/occupational outcomes at age 50. Findings align with Carroll’s Model of School Learning, Cronbach’s formulation of aptitude × treatment interactions, and modern measurement procedures. They support tailoring curricula to academic readiness for maximizing learning. They also highlight how contextual features embedded in educational settings beyond strictly academic material facilitate learning and psychological development.

Dr. Woo is a PhD graduate from the School of Education, University of New South Wales Sydney in Australia and currently teaches gifted education at Seoul National University of Education. Her research interests are gifted education, initial teacher education, gifted adults, gifted underachievers, and the impact of culture on education.

South Korean Pre-Service Primary School Teachers’ Attitudes Towards Gifted Students and Gifted Education

Gifted Education International, September 2023

Co-authors Therese M. Cumming and Susan C. O’Neill

Abstract: This study explores South Korean pre-service primary teachers’ attitudes toward gifted students and gifted education. Qualitative focus group interviews were conducted with 13 South Korean undergraduates who were in their final year of primary education. Analysis of the interviews revealed that culture was a major factor that had affected the pre-service teachers’ attitudes towards gifted education. Even though the participants agreed with the necessity of gifted education to meet gifted students’ distinctive intellectual and emotional needs, they tended to have negative attitudes toward gifted education in South Korea because of the highly competitive educational atmosphere. The South Korean pre-service teachers admitted that taking a gifted education course could be somewhat helpful but not enough. They suggested that there should be more elective gifted education course offerings and that the current compulsory special education courses should devote more time and space to gifted education.

Dr. Young is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Medical Social Sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and a licensed psychologist. She earned her doctorate from the University of Texas at Austin and completed her clinical internship at Dell Children’s Hospital/Dell Medical School, followed by a clinical fellowship at Children’s Hospital Colorado/The University of Colorado School of Medicine. Her research centers on improving the efficiency and accuracy of cognitive assessment through innovative technology solutions. Early in her career, Dr. Young gained recognition for conducting the first independent validations of the International Cognitive Ability Resource, a pioneering open-source cognitive measurement system with utility for identifying high-ability individuals. Currently, Dr. Young serves as principal investigator or co-investigator on multiple large-scale, NIH-funded projects that leverage mobile applications to track cognitive trajectories across the lifespan.

The International Cognitive Ability Resource: An Open Science Measure Useful for Research With High-Ability Postsecondary Students

Gifted Child Quarterly, October 2021

Co-authors Danika L. S. Maddocks and Jamison E. Carrigan

Abstract: Research on high-ability postsecondary students has increased in recent years; yet identifying such students can be challenging. The International Cognitive Ability Resource (ICAR) is an online, open-access tool designed to facilitate measurement of cognitive abilities in research. We evaluated whether the ICAR is appropriate to identify high-ability postsecondary students for research; high ability was classified by a General Ability Index score of 120 or higher on the WAIS-IV. In a sample of 97 students from a U.S. university (mean age 22.47 years, mean General Ability Index score 115.13), the 60-item ICAR demonstrated adequate diagnostic accuracy to identify high ability with three appropriate cut scores (33, 34, or 35 items correct out of 60). The 16-item ICAR had no appropriate cut scores but demonstrated validity as a brief cognitive ability measure that could be used to examine relations between intelligence and other variables. Findings suggest that the ICAR could be a useful open-source tool for research with high-ability college students.