Position Title
Associate Professor
Education
- Ph.D., University of Minnesota, Institute of Child Development, 2013
- M.A., Child Psychology, University of Minnesota, 2010
- B.S., Psychology, Honors College, Towson University, 2008
About
Camelia Hostinar is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology. Dr. Hostinar studies how the social environment shapes health, with a focus on the activity of stress-response systems. She is examining the pathways linking early-life stress to later disease and investigating protective processes that could modify these adverse trajectories
She operates the Social Environment and Stress (SES) Lab, in which she welcomes the participation of graduate students with interest in this area of study.
She also is affiliated with the UC Davis Center for Poverty Research.
Research Focus
Dr. Hostinar researches the ways in which childhood poverty and other forms of early-life adversity influence later development and health. She has particular interest in protective factors that may buffer children and adolescents from chronic stress and subsequent physical or mental health problems. Her research examines developmental processes at multiple levels of analysis, incorporating endocrine and immune biomarkers, electrophysiological data, and behavioral measures. She seeks to improve understanding of the role of early-life stress in shaping self-regulatory skills, and to illuminate how stress-buffering processes such as supportive social relationships exert their effects.
Lab
Publications
Alen, N. V., Deer, L. K., & Hostinar, C. E. (in press). Respiratory sinus arrhythmia as a resilience marker for children’s health. Psychosomatic Medicine.
Hostinar, C. E., Swartz, J. R., Alen, N. V., Guyer, A. E., & Hastings, P. D. (in press). The role of stress phenotypes in understanding childhood adversity as a transdiagnostic risk factor for psychopathology. Journal of Psychopathology and Clinical Science.
Swartz, J. R., Carranza, A. F., Tully, L. M., Knodt, A. R., Jiang, J., Irwin, M. R., & Hostinar, C. E. (2021). Associations between peripheral inflammation and resting state functional connectivity in adolescents. Brain, Behavior, and Immunity. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbi.2021.02.018
Alen, N. V., Deer, L. K., Karimi, M., Feyzieva, E., Hastings, P. D., & Hostinar, C. E. (2021). Children’s altruism following acute stress: The role of autonomic nervous system activity and social support. Developmental Science. https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.13099
Shields, G. S., Deer, L. K., Hastings, P. D., & Hostinar, C. E. (2021). Adiposity, inflammation, and working memory: Longitudinal evidence for a vicious cycle. Brain, Behavior, and Immunity-Health, 13, 100202.
Alen, N. V., Deer, L. K., & Hostinar, C. E. (2020). Autonomic nervous system activity predicts increasing serum inflammatory cytokines in children. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 119, 104745. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psyneuen.2020.104745
Parenteau, A. M., Alen, N. V., Deer, L. K., Nissen, A. T., Luck, A. T. & Hostinar, C. E. (2020). Parenting matters: Parents can reduce or amplify children’s anxiety and cortisol responses to acute stress. Development and Psychopathology, 32(5), 1799-1809. doi: 10.1017/S0954579420001285
Hostinar, C. E. (2015). Recent developments in the study of social relationships, stress responses, and physical health. Current Opinion in Psychology, 5, 90-95.
Hostinar, C. E., Ross, K. M., Chen, E., & Miller, G. E. (2015). Modeling the association between lifecourse socioeconomic disadvantage and systemic inflammation in healthy adults: The role of self-control. Health Psychology, 34(6), 580-90.
Hostinar, C. E., Sullivan, R. M., & Gunnar, M. R. (2014). Psychobiological mechanisms underlying the social buffering of the HPA axis: A review of animal models and human studies across development. Psychological Bulletin, 140(1), 256-282.
Hostinar, C. E., Stellern, S. A., Schaefer, C., Carlson, S. M., & Gunnar, M. R. (2012). Associations between early life adversity and executive function in children adopted internationally from orphanages. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 109(2), 17208-12.
Teaching
Camelia Hostinar teaches subject matter related to developmental psychology, health psychology, and research methods.
Awards
- Boyd McCandless Award, American Psychological Association Division 7, 2022
- Early Career Outstanding Paper Award, American Psychological Association Division 7 (American Psychologist)
- Distinguished Teaching Award, UC Davis Psychology Department, 2020
- Society for Research in Child Development Early Career Contributions Award, 2019
- Association for Psychological Science Rising Star Award, 2015
- Outstanding Dissertation Award, Society for Research in Child Development, 2015
- NIH F32 Award (Postdoctoral NRSA), National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2014