Three fourth-year Honours Specialization in Psychology students proudly showcased their research alongside experts from a range of disciplines at the Children's Health Research Conference (CHRC), held at King's on May 20-21, 2025.
As part of the poster presentation session, the students engaged with peers, faculty, and professionals in a dynamic exchange of ideas spanning topics from child development and mental health to pediatric medicine.
Montana Tries presented on "Substances and sex differences on the spectrum: Investigating substance use behaviours between male and female autistic adolescents." From this project, using the Healthy Brain Network (HBN) dataset to recruit autistic and non-autistic adolescents, Tries discovered that although being male or female was not a predictor for using substances, autistic adolescents were three times less likely to report using substances compared to non-autistic adolescents.
Working with her two supervisors, Dr. Kathleen Lyons, Assistant Professor of Psychology, and Dr. Laura Rosen, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Tries found that females are severely underrepresented in the broader literature, and autism tends to be diagnosed more often in males compared to females. There was also a huge gap in sex differences in autistic people in relation to substance use.
Tries says that Drs. Lyons and Rosen supported her in attending the conference and provided feedback on the presentation.
"I was very excited to showcase my years' worth of hard work to other people, and converse with others about my work and the topic at hand," says Tries. While she was nervous about presenting her work to an audience for the first time, she enjoyed the experience and was happy to see that the audience appreciated her work and were intrigued by the results.
"That overall made me feel very happy, excited and accomplished in my work and the presentation I gave," says Tries.
Maream Al Rajab presented on "Developing a resource guide for caregivers featuring culture and diversity and therapeutic storybooks," which highlighted the power of bibliotherapy as part of a stepped-care model for supporting children's mental health.
As part of the project, Al Rajab shared a curated list of culturally inclusive storybooks and three core principles for caregivers to use when engaging children with therapeutic literature. This offered a meaningful way to support children's emotional well-being, identity development, and social understanding.
The project had its beginnings as part of Al Rajab's placement at the Mary J. Wright Child and Youth Development Clinic, which she received through the practicum class taught by Dr. Cathy Chovaz, Chair and Associate Professor of Psychology.
Dr. Colin King, Al Rajab's placement supervisor, provided her the chance to present her work, and offered guidance and, along with the clinic faculty, support throughout the process.
"Presenting as part of the conference was a really rewarding experience. It allowed me to share meaningful work with others while also learning about a variety of other interesting topics. Overall, it was a great learning opportunity," says Al Rajab.
Rachel Bubela presented on "Shy but social: the ups and downs of social media use for shy adolescents and emerging adults," which summarizes the thesis research she completed with Dr. Wendy Ellis, Associate Professor of Psychology.
Bubela's research examined social media use in shy adolescents and young adults, while exploring some of the potential benefits of social media use, utilizing a scale designed by Bubela and Dr. Ellis for the study. The study found that while time spent on social media did not differ between shy and non-shy participants, the friendship quality of participants benefited from more interactive social media use and social connectedness online.
Bubela says that Dr. Ellis was "extremely supportive" throughout the entire research process.
"I also feel lucky to have been part of such a close-knit thesis class where we constantly cheered each other on. It was a wonderful opportunity to participate in the CHRC poster session. I gained valuable insights about recent research developments and met several inspiring researchers," says Bubela.
The conference brought together youth, families, and professionals from various disciplines, including researchers, educators, and clinicians, behavioural therapists, occupational therapists, physical therapists, speech-language pathologists, recreational therapists, social workers, nurses, and physicians. It also included service leaders, and undergraduate and graduate students.
