Please read about the candidates and cast your vote below:
President Elect
Tara L. Gruenewald, Ph.D., MPH
- Education, employment history and current position
Tara Gruenewald is an Associate Professor and Chair of the Psychology Department at Chapman University. She also serves as Administrative Director of the Institute of Interdisciplinary Brain and Behavioral Sciences. Dr. Gruenewald completed a B.S in Psychobiology from the University of California, Davis and then a PhD in Social Psychology with a minor in Health Psychology at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). She also completed a postdoctoral Masters in Public Health in Health Services and Health Policy at UCLA. Prior to joining the faculty at Chapman, Dr. Gruenewald served on the faculty of the UCLA School of Medicine in the Division of Geriatrics and in the Davis School of Gerontology at the University of Southern California (USC). She also received a Career Development Award from the National Institute of Aging (NIA) to apply her training in Health Psychology to the field of aging.
- Summary of professional career, roles, and areas of interests
Dr. Gruenewald is a social and health psychologist whose research focuses on the psychobiological mechanisms through which social environments can affect functioning and health across the life course. One dominant line of her research has sought to understand how our status in society and in more proximal social groups and relationships shapes our cognitions, emotions, and physiology in ways that have import for cognitive and physical functioning, health, and longevity. Another line of her work has focused on harnessing the power of positive social connections and individuals’ desires to contribute to others to promote healthy aging and generative engagement. She has been fortunate to have ongoing research support from the NIA and to be a part of multiple longitudinal cohort studies of health and aging. Dr. Gruenewald is a Fellow of the Gerontological Society of America and the American Psychosomatic Society.
- Activities related to the APS and other non-profit organizations
Dr. Gruenewald has been engaged with APS for over 20 years since she began attending annual meetings as a graduate student. Her service to the society includes being a member of the APS Program Committee (2009 - 2011), a member of the APS Council (2014 – 2017), an active participant of the 2015 APS Strategic Planning Retreat, a member of the APS Nominating Committee (2015 – 2016), an APS Council Liaison for the Professional Education Committee (2015 – 2017), and APS Secretary-Treasurer (2019 – 2022). Dr. Gruenewald has also been an active member of the Gerontological Society of America where she served on the Program Committee (2014 – 2016, 2016 Co-Chair). She was a longtime member of the Board of Directors for the California Council on Gerontology and Geriatrics (CCGG) and served as CCGG President (2016 – 2018), Past President (2018 – 2020), and a member of the CCGG Development, Awards, and Education Committees. She has served as a member of numerous NIA and foundation working groups focused on life course social disparities in health and stress measurement, and as an ad hoc member of multiple National Institutes of Health study sections.
- Candidacy statement (personal views of the APS and its future)
The public health, environmental, economic, and social challenges of recent years make clear the essential value of our basic science and clinical research. As the world increasingly accepts the integration of mind, body, and social context in maintaining health, we must continue to provide the evidence base, education and advocacy needed to advance mind-body medicine. This includes capitalizing on our molecular, cellular, and other methodological advances to highlight the critical role of the social environment in shaping our health and well-being. APS is uniquely positioned to lead these efforts. Our longstanding effort to champion the cutting-edge mechanistic and clinical science of scholars from diverse disciplines extends our reach across the scientific and clinical spectrums. Our impact will depend on the continued strengthening of our own pillars of support in the society, including our journal and the diversity and vibrancy of our membership, as well as our efforts to connect with external allies in advocacy for the continued support of mind-body science and the translational applications of our scientific discoveries.
Council (vote for 2)
Christopher Celano, MD
- Education, employment history and current position
Christopher Celano, M.D., is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and Associate Director of the Cardiac Psychiatry Research Program (CPRP) at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). Dr. Celano received his B.A. degree in Psychology from the Johns Hopkins University in 2003 and his M.D. degree from the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in 2007. He then completed the MGH/McLean adult psychiatry residency training program (2007-2011) and a fellowship in consultation-liaison psychiatry (2011-2012). After completing his clinical training, Dr. Celano joined the faculty at MGH, where he provides clinical care and performs research as part of the CPRP. He became the Associate Director of the CPRP in 2016.
- Summary of professional career, roles, and areas of interests
Dr. Celano’s research focuses on the promotion of mental and physical health in individuals with cardiovascular disease and other chronic medical illnesses. His current work focuses most specifically on the development and implementation of interventions to promote well-being and health behavior adherence in individuals with cardiovascular disease and other chronic medical conditions. He completed a K23 career development award from 2015-2021 and is the PI of an R01-funded, randomized, controlled trial to evaluate the efficacy of a positive psychology-based intervention to promote adherence in heart failure. Additional research interests include the implementation of collaborative care interventions to treat depression and anxiety disorders in medical populations, the relationships between psychological constructs and health, and the effects of psychiatric medications on QT prolongation. He has published over 100 articles (>40 as first or senior author), including over 60 original research articles and five meta-analyses, and has presented the results of his work at national and international conferences.
- Activities related to the APS and other non-profit organizations
Dr. Celano has been an active member of APS since 2013. He has attended and presented his work at multiple APS annual meetings since that time and has served on the Program Committee for the past two years. Dr. Celano also has contributed to the Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry (ACLP) and the American Psychiatric Association (APA). For the former, he is the chair of the Research and Evidence-based Practice Committee and is a member of the ACLP’s Board of Directors. For the latter, he was a corresponding member to the Council on Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry from 2019-2022 and currently is a member of this Council.
- Candidacy statement (personal views of the APS and its future)
With its mission of advancing science of the relationships between “biological, psychological, behavioral, and social factors” and health, the American Psychosomatic Society aims to serve as a professional home for researchers conducting basic, translational, and clinical research in psychosomatic medicine. While APS has succeeded at providing this home for many researchers, there are relatively few clinicians and clinical researchers present at APS annual meetings, which may make it difficult to integrate many of the scientific findings of our membership into clinical care. If elected to the Council, Dr. Celano would increase the reach of APS to clinicians and clinical researchers engaged in the practice of psychosomatic medicine. He would promote collaborations between APS and other professional organizations (e.g., Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry, American Psychiatric Association) to identify promising psychosomatic medicine researchers who may benefit from and contribute to APS. Furthermore, he would provide opportunities for clinical, basic, and translational researchers to interact and develop collaborations that might yield new research ideas or lead to the integration of research findings into clinical care. Finally, he would foster mentorship of early-stage investigators and clinicians who are interested in becoming more involved in research.
Michael Stanton, Ph.D.
- Education, employment history and current position
Michael V. Stanton, PhD, is an Associate Professor at California State University East Bay (CSU East Bay), where he has been since 2016. Dr. Stanton earned a B.A. at Brown University and a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology (focus: Behavioral Medicine) from Duke University. He completed his clinical internship in Behavioral Medicine at the Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System (VA Palo Alto; affiliate of Stanford University). Dr. Stanton stayed at Stanford University and the VA Palo Alto for a post-doctoral fellowship in Behavioral Medicine, and then joined the faculty at CSU East Bay in 2016.
- Summary of professional career, roles, and areas of interests
Dr. Stanton’s research examines biobehavioral correlates of stress, obesity risk, and resilience, with a focus on mindfulness as an intervention. Specifically, he has published about links between psychosocial stress and obesity or obesity-related conditions like physical activity, diet, and sleep, mechanisms of this stress-related pathway including genetic predispositions, and mindfulness-based programs to treat stress and obesity-related conditions. He also has published on health equity and anti-Black racism in Medicine, the cardiovascular effects of discrimination, and the health effects of coping with stress among people of color.
Dr. Stanton has 33 research publications in peer-reviewed journals and he has garnered grants from federal and private sources, including with the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) and NHLBI and several competitive grants at his home institution.
- Activities related to the APS and other non-profit organizations
Dr. Stanton has always felt at home at APS and has been attending the APS meeting since 2007 with his graduate school mentor past-president Redford Williams. He has served most recently as the co-chair of the Anti-Racism Task Force (since 2/2021) and he currently serves as a member of the Annual Meeting Program Committee Member (2022-2023). He was previously a member of the APS Social Media Committee (2019-2022). He is a former recipient of the Minority Initiative Travel Scholarship 2009 and has attended and presented at meetings from Long Beach to Vancouver, BC to Sevilla, Spain.
In addition to APS, Dr. Stanton is currently a member of the Duke Alumni Association, Northern California (2018-present), and he was recently a member of the Nominations Committee for Society of Behavioral Medicine (2021-22), the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation New Connections Program (2017-present), and the Fulbright Association, Northern California Chapter (2016-2018).
- Candidacy statement (personal views of the APS and its future)
The American Psychosomatic Society is a unique organization with members from around the world and from varied backgrounds, coming together with an opportunity to collaborate and support each other as scientists and clinicians. APS has built a rock solid reputation upon years of hard work and top notch science. APS can continue to be a leader in the way it brings together a new collaborators and colleagues, from varied racial and ethnic backgrounds, and also from state or regional universities or historically Black and Latino institutions, offering our expertise to a broader range of members and also learning much ourselves from these new partners along the way. With such an impressive list of esteemed scientists and clinicians, APS could be a voice for policy change, providing valuable information for policymakers that has the power to change the lives of people across the country. Moreover, APS has the potential to harness new technologies to better collaborate seamlessly among APS members and also to disseminate the exceptional research of our members to non-scientific audiences around the world.
Nominating Committee-at-Large (vote for 1)
Maria Llabre, Ph.D.
- Education, employment history and current position
Dr. Llabre received her PhD in Educational Research from the University of Florida in 1978, and joined the faculty at the University of Miami upon graduation, first in the School of Education and since 1988 in the Department of Psychology, College of Arts and Sciences where is a professor and Cooper Fellow. From 2014-2021 she was Associate Chair and Director of Graduate Studies in Psychology.
- Summary of professional career, roles, and areas of interests
Dr. Llabre is a methodologist with more than 40 years of experience teaching graduate level statistics and mentoring graduate students and postdoctoral fellows in applications of quantitative methods to problems in psychology and behavioral science. Her previous work focused on latent variable models and their application to problems in measurement, mechanisms, and change processes in behavioral medicine, including cardiovascular reactivity to stress. Currently, she is an investigator in the Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos where her work includes understanding sociocultural risk and protective factors in cardiovascular disease.
- Activities related to the APS and other non-profit organizations
Dr. Llabre joined the APS in 2004 and served on their Executive Council from 2011 through 2014 and on the Program Committee in 2006-2009. She was a member of the Nominating Committee in 2012 and the Membership Committee in 2012 – 2014. She was also a member of the Planning Committee for the Specialty Conference on Obesity Diabetes and the Brain in 2013. Dr. Llabre was also the Statistics Editor of Psychosomatic Medicine from 2005 to 2015 and has since been a member of their editorial board. In addition to APS, Dr. Llabre served as program co-chair of APA Division 38 in 1992. In 2012-2020 she was Chair of the APA Panel on Guidelines for the Treatment of Obesity. She also served on the council for the Academy of Behavioral Medicine Research (ABMR) from 2003 – 2007 and from 2008 – 2015 served as Secretary. In 2022 she was awarded the ABMR lifetime service award. Currently, Dr. Llabre serves on the Publications Committee for the Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos.
- Candidacy statement (personal views of the APS and its future)
As the premier interdisciplinary organization advancing and promoting knowledge of the interplay among biological, psychological, and sociocultural factors that influence health and disease, the APS’ leadership and strength is critical for the field of psychosomatic medicine. Leaders in this vital organization must have commitment and vision. As a member of the nominating committee, I will work to identify principled candidates who will advance the mission, promote diversity along multiple dimensions, and maintain the high standards of the APS.
Julian Thayer, Ph.D.
- Education, employment history and current position
B.A. with Honors in Psychology, Indiana University, 1981; M.A. Experimental Psychology, New York University, 1984; Ph.D. Psychophysiology with minor in Quantitative Psychology, New York University, 1986. Positions: Instructor, Penn State University, 1984-1986; Asst Professor, Penn State University, 1986-1993; Visiting Professor of Psychology and Pedagogy, Free University of Amsterdam, 1995; Assoc Professor of Clinical Psychology, University of Missouri-Columbia, 1993-2000; Special Expert, National Institute on Aging (NIA), 1998-2000; Professor II, University of Bergen, Norway, 1999-2013; Section Chief, NIA, 2000-2005; The Ohio Eminent Scholar Professor in Health Psychology and Professor of Neuroscience, The Ohio State University, 2006-2019; Visiting Professor, Sapienza University, Rome, Italy, 2018; The Ohio Eminent Scholar Professor in Health Psychology and Professor of Neuroscience Emeritus and Academy Professor, The Ohio State University, 2019-present; Visiting Professor, University of Padua, Italy, 2019; Distinguished University Professor of Psychological Science, University of California, Irvine, 2019-present.
- Summary of professional career, roles, and areas of interests
Dr. Thayer is one of the world’s leading experts in heart rate variability research in relation to mental and physical health. He has authored some of the most widely cited papers on this topic including experimental and observational studies in human and animal models of stress as well as influential papers that elucidate the neurovisceral integration model. His work has taken a lifespan perspective and covers infancy to old age. His recent review on stress and aging is particularly relevant to the present proposal and details the changes that take place in middle adulthood. These papers highlight the importance of heart rate variability not only as a marker of health, but a highly sensitive indicator of the degree to which the brain’s “integrative” system of adaptive regulation provides flexible control over the periphery. Dr. Thayer's conceptual thinking is made all the more relevant through the application of sophisticated modeling techniques for evaluating the extent to which heart rate variability indicates adaptive flexibility versus static imbalance of the autonomic nervous system and related psychophysiological systems.
- Activities related to the APS and other non-profit organizations
APS member since 1993; Early Career Award for Contributions to Psychosomatic Medicine, American Psychosomatic Society, 1996; Recipient, Visiting Scholar Award to University of Leiden, the Netherlands, American Psychosomatic Society, 1999; Executive Council, American Psychosomatic Society , 2000-2003; Started Diversity Initiative, American Psychosomatic Society, 2002; Program Chair, American Psychosomatic Society, 2003-2004; Chair, Ad Hoc Committee on New Initiative, American Psychosomatic Society, 2018-2022; Society for Psychophysiological Research (SPR) member since 1981; Ad Hoc Reviewer, Psychophysiology, 1984-present; Nominee, Distinguished Early Career Contribution to Psychophysiology, 1987; By-Laws Committee, 1991-1994; Program Committee, 1991, 2010, 2017; Host Committee (Chair) 2002; Associate Editor, Psychophysiology, 1998-2003; Roundtable Discussion Leader, 2009, 2010, 2013, 2014; Ad Hoc Diversity Committee 2010-2016 (Chair, 2010); Pre-conference Workshop on Consumer Psychophysiology, 2015; Public Relations Committee, 2018-present; Consulting Editor, Psychophysiology, 2018-present; Distinguished Scientific Contribution to Psychophysiology Award, The Society for Psychophysiological Research, 2018; President-elect, SPR 2023; Distinguished Scientist Award, Society of Behavioral Medicine, 2019; Outstanding Lifetime Achievement Award, Academy of Behavioral Medicine Research, 2021; Excellence in Complementary and Integrative Rehabilitation Medicine Research Award, American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine, 2022; Associate Editor, Psychosomatic Medicine, 2022-present.
- Candidacy statement (personal views of the APS and its future)
APS has been my academic home for over 30 years. In an effort to increase the inclusion of diverse voices to the APS I initiated the Diversity Initiative over 20 years ago. As a result, the representation of underrepresented persons on the Journal Editorial Board, in the Society’s leadership, and at the Society’s meeting have increased immensely. However, there is much more work to do. As a member of the Nomination Committee my hope is to further increase the diversity of APS and therefore further strengthen this already great organization.
Nominating Committee-Council (vote for 1)
Keely A. Muscatell, Ph.D.
- Education, employment history and current position
Keely A. Muscatell is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She also holds appointments at the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, the Biomedical Research Imaging Center, and the Carolina Population Center at UNC. Dr. Muscatell earned her PhD in Psychology (social/health) from UCLA in 2013. She completed post-doctoral training in the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health and Society Scholars program at UC San Francisco and UC Berkeley, before starting as a faculty member at UNC in 2016.
- Summary of professional career, roles, and areas of interests
Dr. Muscatell’s research focuses on understanding the mechanisms through which social inequities become health inequities. As such, much of her work investigates the neural, psychological, and immunological processes through which societal and social stressors affect health and well-being. Dr. Muscatell’s research is highly interdisciplinary, utilizing theory and methods from experimental social psychology, social and affective neuroscience, psychoneuroimmunology, psychopharmacology, and population health. Her current work focuses on understanding the neural and inflammatory processes through which racism-related stress influences health and well-being for Black Americans, and how increases in inflammation in the body influence social functioning. She pursues this work in collaboration with a diverse and brilliant team of post-doctoral, doctoral, and undergraduate trainees in the Social Neuroscience and Health Lab. Indeed, Dr. Muscatell strives to be a compassionate and supportive mentor in her efforts to train the next generation of biopsychosocial scientists. She also serves as co-chair of the Diversity, Equity and Inclusivity Committee in her department.
- Activities related to APS and other non-profit organizations
Dr. Muscatell has been attending the APS annual meeting since her memorable first meeting in Portland in 2010 back when she was a graduate student. Her commitment to APS stems from her appreciation of the organization’s unique combination of both rigorous, cutting-edge research together with a culture of inclusivity and supportiveness that is far too rare in scientific organizations. Dr. Muscatell served as a member of the APS Annual Meeting Program Committee from 2018-2020, and contributed to planning and programming for the Affective Neuroscience channel for the 2021 virtual meeting. Dr. Muscatell has also served as a member of the strategic planning committee for Psychosomatic Medicine. As an APS Council Member, Dr. Muscatell has led efforts to enhance communication at the society, worked with Council to create a code of ethics and conduct, and is involved with efforts to strategically re-evaluate the annual meeting.
- Candidacy statement
The past few years have brought broad awareness to issues that APS members have been investigating for decades; rarely before have connections between social relationships and disease transmission or racial and socioeconomic inequities in health been discussed with such regularity in the public at-large. As a member of the Nominating Committee, Dr. Muscatell will work to identify leaders who can put APS at the forefront of these important conversations, while also enhancing the growth and vitality of APS internally. Dr. Muscatell’s interdisciplinary research interests give her unique insight into individuals both within and outside of APS who could effectively serve in leadership roles. This perspective will allow her to help the Nominating Committee identify possible future APS leaders who might otherwise be overlooked.
Daryl O'Connor, Ph.D.
- Education, employment history and current position
Dr O’Connor received his PhD from University of Liverpool, UK and then was appointed to a World Health Organization-funded Postdoctoral Fellowship based at Manchester Royal Infirmary and University of Manchester, UK. He was appointed to a (tenured) lectureship in health psychology, later becoming Senior Lecturer and he is currently Professor of Psychology at the University of Leeds, UK. Dr O’Connor was Deputy Director of the School of Psychology, University of Leeds between 2006 and 2011 and heads up the Laboratory for Stress and Health Research (STARlab) and leads the School's Health and Social Psychology Research Group.
- Summary of professional career, roles, and areas of interests
Dr O’Connor’s current research focuses on: i) investigating the effects of stress and psychological interventions on health outcomes (e.g. suicide, eating, cortisol levels) and understanding the role of individual differences variables (e.g. perseverative cognition, childhood trauma, conscientiousness) within the stress process; and ii) exploring the effects of implementation intentions-based interventions on cancer screening behaviours. His research findings have also informed major national and international reports to organizations such as the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Special Programme on Development and Research Training in Human Reproduction and he has been an advisor to WHO. In terms of funding, over the last 10-15 years, his research has attracted considerable funding from UK research councils (e.g., Economic and Social Research Council, National Institute for Health Research), from industry (e.g., Unilever), from Charities (e.g., Yorkshire Cancer Research) and from the United States Department of Defense. Dr O’Connor was Joint Editor-in-Chief for Psychology & Health (2011-2019), is Editor-in-Chief for Cogent Psychology (2021 - ), he is Associate Editor for Psychosomatic Medicine (2022 - ) and is a member of the Editorial Committee for the Annual Review of Psychology. Alongside his research activities, over the last fifteen years, he has also made a substantial contribution to the British Psychological Society by providing leadership (as Chair and/or Deputy Chair) to the BPS Division of Health Psychology, the BPS Psychobiology Section and was Chair of BPS Research Board and a Trustee of the Society between 2015 and 2021. Dr O’Connor has been elected Fellow of the Academy of Behavioral Medicine Research (ABMR), is a Distinguished International Affiliate of APA Division 38 (Health Psychology), is a Fellow of the Academy of Society Sciences (FAcSS) and the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA) and was awarded Honorary Lifetime Membership of the British Psychological Society in 2021.
- Activities related to APS and other non-profit organizations
Dr O’Connor has been a regular attender of the APS conferences for many years. He is a member of APS Council and has served as an active member of the Society’s Annual Scientific Meeting Program Committee, served on the APS Social Media committee and has previously been member-at-large of the APS Nominating Committee. He also joined Psychosomatic Medicine as an Associate Editor in January 2022. He is also a current member of the Academy of Behavioral Medicine Research’s (ABMR) Communications Committee. In the British and European psychological community, Dr O’Connor has played a high profile role leading psychological research and influencing policy in the UK through the numerous chair positions he has held over the last 10-15 years. Mostly notably he was Chair of the British Psychological Society’s Research Board and past Chair of the BPS Division of Health Psychology and BPS Psychobiology Section. He was also Chair and Convenor of the European Federation of Psychology Associations Board of Scientific Affairs. Dr O’Connor has also been actively involved in promoting Open Science and improving psychological science nationally and across Europe.
During COVID-19 and lockdown, Dr O’Connor played a key role in supporting the British Psychological Society’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. He has been Deputy Chair of the BPS COVID-19 Coordinating Group, been a member of the BPS COVID-19 Behaviour Science and Disease Prevention workstream and led the BPS COVID-19 Research Priorities Group.
- Candidacy statement
The American Psychosomatic Society is the premier scientific organization for scientists working at the interface of behavior and medicine. It is comprised of the very best investigators and it promotes and supports cutting-edge biobehavioral science. To my European colleagues, I describe the APS Annual Meeting as “the very best of its kind and by far the finest meeting I attend each year”. To my mind, the Society’s long established focus on supporting colleagues at all career stages and from all backgrounds is particularly impressive, especially how it mentors, nurtures and helps to develop early career researchers. I’ve always been struck by the strong, inspiring and visionary leadership demonstrated by the Society; therefore, it would be huge honor to serve on APS Nominating Committee as the Council representative.
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