Dr. Veilleux
Research Interests
I consider myself a clinical psychologist who “lives” at the intersection of clinical, social, and personality psychology. I am generally interested in processes that underlie psychopathology, but from a transdiagnostic lens–I am not a clinical psychologist who studies one disorder or problem, but in the processes that undercut and connect *many* kinds of problems.
I am broadly interested in where self-control and emotion meet–how emotions contribute to temptation situations (e.g., peoples urges and cravings and their choices to “give in” or resist a desire), how people see themselves as more or less agentic, and how efforts to control the self contribute to emotional outcomes. I am particularly interested in people’s abilities to tolerate or “sit with” their feelings (distress tolerance) and how beliefs about emotions influence people’s emotion-related choices (emotion-related impulsivity, efforts to avoid or escape from feeling emotions, etc.).
Although some of my work is “basic” in nature (i.e., studying people without diagnosed problems), I’m ultimately interested in the role of emotion and self-control for people who struggle with emotions (which is almost everyone in therapy) and those who struggle with self-control. I am interested in people who see themselves has having too little self control (i.e., people who use substance, binge eat, engage in non-suicidal self-injury, and those with a borderline personality disorder diagnosis) and those who overemphasize control (i.e., anorexia, persistent depression, obsessive-compulsive personality disorder). I also love assessment (I have done many scale development and task development studies) with the ultimate goal of trying to better understand people’s emotional lives and the self-control choices they make.
All of my work, both basic and applied, uses various methodologies, including qualitative coding, survey development, individual difference survey studies, and laboratory studies using experimental manipulation. In the last several years, my primary methodology has been ecological momentary assessment, where people complete brief repeated reports from a cell phone application multiple times per day. This method allows for a nuanced understanding of the emotional responses and self-regulation choices people make in daily life.
I have developed a secondary research interest in issues surrounding clinical training. In particular, I have studied the perceptions of competency development in clinical psychology graduate students, and I am involved with ongoing research to understand graduate students in psychology who may be struggling within their programs. I am also interested in research on supervision. I am spearheading a project to develop “standardized supervisees” to enhance the training of novice clinical supervisors.
Teaching Interests
At the undergraduate level, I have taught research methods and statistics, two courses students tend to dread yet I find both fun and fascinating. I have also taught Abnormal Psychology and a course aimed at teaching undergrads basic clinical interviewing skills. Lately I have also been teaching Personality for undergraduates and Advanced Seminar, one of the options for the undergraduate capstone course in Psychology. My seminar focuses on emotion and self-regulation and provides an overview of the research in self- and emotion-regulation, as well as how the research lessons can be applied to daily life.
At the graduate level, I teach the Personality Theory and Assessment course, and I provide clinical supervision to doctoral students in the Clinical Training Program. I also teach the special topics practicum on supervision and consultation which dovetails with my interests in training clinical supervisors. I have also taught a graduate seminar on emotion and emotion regulation in psychotherapy.
Please see the Teaching tab for more resources and information related to the courses I teach.
Personal Interests/Bio
Growing up in Champaign, Illinois, I always thought I would become a theatre director. I was actively involved in the theatre program at one of the most amazing high schools in the country, University Laboratory High School, and I even majored in dramatic arts (directing focus) at Macalester College. Yet, several years after I graduated from college, while working at the University of Minnesota School of Music, I took my first psychology course and fell in love with the discipline. For me, psychology allows for creativity and innovation (blending of areas, new methodologies) amidst a tried-and-true process (the scientific method) to answer fascinating questions about human behavior. Throughout graduate school in clinical psychology at the University of Illinois at Chicago, I continued to enjoy the study of psychology and using empirically-based methods to help people struggling with psychological problems.
When I’m not teaching, writing up research, designing research, supervising, etc., I spend time with my husband and two kids (currently aged 9 and 6) by going to parks, museums and generally exploring Northwest Arkansas in kid-friendly ways. I also watch a decent amount of TV (Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Schmigadoon, Shrinking, Ghosts, Fleishman is in Trouble) and I am slowly working my way through watching all of the American Film Institute Top 100 movies of all time (current tally: 75 out of 100). I have a weird fascination with Saved by the Bell and have seen every episode (yes, really, including all seven seasons of the New Class). I like to craft when I allow myself the time, and my theatre and music background has given me a fondness for musical theatre, which I sing along to at the top of my lungs when no one else is around. Current musical obsession: Hadestown!
CV
Jennifer Veilleux CV, and see the Publications page for reprints of selected papers.