A MULTIDIMENSIONAL PERSPECTIVE of HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

​Self-Concept, Identity, Mental Health, and Well-Being

An important part of our research seeks to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of human development through the adoption of a multidimensional perspective that taps into a combination of research areas traditionally associated with developmental psychology, educational psychology, sport and exercise psychology, and social psychology.

In this regard, our research primarily focus on the adolescent period and on the transitions leading to it and out of it. This research seeks to improve our understanding of the development of multidimensional self-conceptions (global, social, and physical), psychopathologies (depression, anxiety, eating disorders), well-being, as well as their psychosocial determinants and outcomes.

A particularly interesting recent area of investigation is related our self-equilibrium and self-complexity hypotheses, proposing the indivisibility of self-concept level and stability and thus suggesting that self-equilibration processes are required to the development of a strong core self which itself should be anchored in multiple areas of self-worth. Although primarily focused on identity development, these theoretical perspectives also have much broader implications for well-being, motivation, and life functioning. 
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Intellectual Disabilities

A equally important part of our work seeks to apply our multidimensional approach to the understanding of human development in order to identify modifiable biopsychosocial determinants of psychosocial and physical well-being for youth with intellectual disabilities through a pioneering longitudinal study simultaneously conducted in Australia and Canada.

Research in this area has traditionally been plagued by small cross ​sectional samples and the reliance on deficit models leading researchers to assume that reports provided by youth with Intellectual Disabilities had no validity. Leveraging our psychometric expertise has allowed us to demonstrate that it was indeed, via proper methods, possible to obtain valid self-reports from youth with Intellectual Disabilities, making this large scale international longitudinal project possible. 

Measurement

Doing research in a French-speaking area creates a challenge due to the lack of psychometrically sound instruments. To address this issue, lab members have been involved in the development of publicly accessible instruments assessing self-concept, well-being, and mental health in French, English, and a variety of other languages.