Identifying Neural Signatures of Racial Discrimination in Black individuals with a Multivariate Data Fusion Approach
Principal Investigator: Negar Fani, Ph.D., ABPP
What are the goals of this study?
Our goals are to: 1) identify the types of daily racial discrimination experienced by Black individuals and a range of coping responses to racial discrimination using daily and in-the-moment assessments, 2) employ an innovative, multivariate approach that fuses these data with multimodal magnetic resonance imaging data. Our goal is to assess the ways in which racial discrimination exposure and mental coping may affect the brain, so that future clinical research, including neuromodulation studies, can therapeutically target these networks.
What are we measuring and how?
We will be measuring: 1) exposure to experiences of racial discrimination, the frequency of this exposure, and the different coping strategies that people use when they experience racial discrimination, 2) the impacts that racial discrimination exposure and subsequent coping strategies have on the brain.
If you are eligible and decide to participate, you will be asked to download an app on your phone. This app will send you a notification 4 times a day to fill out a survey on any experiences of racial discrimination that day and how you coped with that experience. You will do this for 1 month and then you will have 1 magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan.
If you complete all parts of the study, you have the opportunity to earn up to $290.
Who are our participants?
If you are an adult between the ages of 18 and 65, and identify as Black or African American, you may be eligible to participate in our study. If you are interested, please complete this brief eligibility survey. If eligible, you will be contacted shortly by one of our team members.
If you have any questions or would like to speak to a member of our research team, you can email us at gtpaffectneurolab@emory.edu or call us at 404-778-5767.