Prospective Graduate Students

The WELLab is accepting applications for PhD students in the Social & Personality or Aging & Development area (applications due Dec 2024 for Fall 2025 start date). Prospective graduate students should be interested in one or both of the following research topics:

  • Wellbeing structure and change: The WELLab is interested in understanding what wellbeing is and how it functions: both broadly construed wellbeing as well specific components such as positive emotion, sense of purpose, life satisfaction, and social connectedness. We are especially interested in how different components of wellbeing fluctuate and change across time in daily life and across the adult lifespan. 
  • Wellbeing and healthy aging: How does wellbeing influence physical and cognitive health and risk for age-related diseases? Conversely, how do health events (e.g., stroke) and health changes (e.g., cognitive decline) influence wellbeing?

In addition to the above content areas, prospective students should be interested in learning most of the following methodologies: 

  • experience sampling methods 
  • longitudinal methods   
  • secondary data analysis 
  • statistical modeling  
  • coding in R  
  • open science practices  
  • coordinated data analysis (optional) 
  • psychosocial interventions (optional) 

Undergraduate Research Assistants

If you are interested in joining the WELLab for Summer/Fall 2024, please send your CV and a brief statement describing your research interests and experiences to Tori Trammell (trammell@wustl.edu). Research assistants may receive course credit or hourly pay for their work in the WELLab.

If you are interested in joining the WELLab as an honors thesis student in Fall 2024, please email Emily Willroth (emily.w@wustl.edu). Honors thesis students will lead an independent research project using existing data.