Liliana Lengua, Ph.D.
Professor
Advising:
Not accepting new graduate students in 2025-2026.
Interests: My research focuses on children’s resilient and vulnerable responses to economic disadvantage and adversity, identifying protective factors that promote children’s well-being, including parent well-being, parenting and child characteristics, such as self-regulation, temperament and coping.
Research
My research uses a bioecological framework to understand children's emotional, social and behavioral adjustment, examining the complex relations among individual, interpersonal, and contextual factors in development. I am particularly interested in individual differences in children's responses to disadvantage and adversity with the goal of identifying children who are vulnerable or resilient in the face of risk. My research examines children's temperament, self-regulation, appraisals and coping as potential mediators and moderators of the effects of risk on children's adjustment. I'm also interested in the role of parents in protecting children who experience adversity and promoting well-being.
In addition, I have been studying children's individual differences in response to parenting by examining temperament as it interacts and transacts with parenting to predict children's adjustment.
My goal is to enhance our understanding of the etiology of adjustment problems and positive adjustment, both for basic knowledge about development and to inform interventions aimed at preventing adjustment problems and promoting positive adjustment.
Education
Arizona State University (1994)
- August 1, 2023 Center for Child and Family Well-Being (CCFW) receives $2.6M gift from the Ballmer Group
- May 4, 2023 Master's Program in Applied Child and Adolescent Psychology allocated $2.2M in state funding
- December 7, 2022 UW Psychology Receives Two Population Health Initiative Tier 2 Pilot Grants
- November 8, 2022 UW Psychology Faculty Share Reflections on Being First Generation College Students
- September 14, 2021 Liliana Lengua and Andrew Meltzoff explain how scientists are racing to unravel the pandemic’s toll on kids’ brains in this Seattle Times article.
- May 19, 2021 Liliana Lengua, and Robyn Long, of CCFW, bring the Be REAL program to the Youth and Family Services of Mercer Island
- September 24, 2020 Congratulations to Lili Lengua who has been named a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science.
- June 10, 2020 Tune in to the Graduate School Public Lectures Special Series: Coexisting with COVID-19, June 11 at 6:30 pm: COVID and Mental Health, featuring Jonathan Kanter and Liliana Lengua.
- June 1, 2020 Liliana Lengua is featured in this Seattle Times article about helping teens deal with the pandemic
- May 27, 2020 The Population Health Initiative granted awards for COVID-19 rapid response to twenty one faculty-led teams, representing ten different schools. Liliana Lengua, Stephanie Thompson and Becca Calhoun received one for their work
- May 15, 2020 Liliana Lengua talks about self-compassion for Mother’s Day, in this UWNews article
- August 9, 2019 Liliana Lengua study featured in article about how adversity affects young children in this India Today article.
- May 10, 2019 Liliana Lengua was quoted in this Q13 article about balancing the schedule of busy kids.
- May 1, 2019 Congratulations to Liliana Lengua and her team, which has been awarded a UW Population Health Initiative pilot research grant.
- March 25, 2019 Congratulations to Tiffany Luu, who works with Liliana Lengua, who has been awarded a Mary Gates Research Scholarship!
- March 21, 2019 Congratulations to Lili Lengua, co-investigator on a project recently awarded research grant funding from the Population Health Initiative! The award is for research on supporting Latinx parents of young children with tools for parenting, stress management and legal education.
- December 13, 2018 Liliana Lengua is quoted in this article in NBC’s Better online magazine about emotion-driven holiday spending
- October 4, 2018 This UW News article shares how Liliana Lengua and the Center for Child and Family Well-Being find positive results from mindful parenting.
- March 2, 2018 Katy Fladeboe’s paper, titled Caregiver Perceptions of Stress and Sibling Conflict During Pediatric Cancer Treatment, has been selected as the featured article for the next Journal of Pediatric Psychology.
- September 27, 2016 Liliana Lengua just received funding from The Center for Contemporary Mind in Society for her work titled: A Mindfulness Program to Build a Culture of Compassion in School and Strengthen Teacher’s Resilience in Supporting Students Facing Adversity.
- January 28, 2015 Lili Lengua reminds us of the importance of a strong family – however it looks for the people in it.
- December 10, 2014 Good study habits last a lifetime. Thanks for the great foundation Lili Lengua -
- August 23, 2012 Liliana Lengua was interviewed by UW Today for an article titled "Back to School Tips for Parents for UW Psychologists".
- October 17, 2011 Liliana Lengua was interviewed for a King TV's HealthLink presentation on "Parenting style matched to child's temperament cuts anxiety and depression"
- August 9, 2011 Doctoral student Cara Kiff and faculty member Liliana Lengua's research on parenting styles was featured in UW Today.
- September 29, 2009 Liliana Lengua is co-author of a paper published in the journal General Hospital Psychiatry and highlighted by UW News and Information Services.
- April 20, 2009 Liliana Lengua and Jeansok Kim have been promoted to full professor.
- March 30, 2009 Liliana Lengua was interviewed by KING TV for "Talking with children about the family's financial situation" which aired on KONG TV on March 17.
- April 11, 2008 The UW Clinical Psychology program has received a number 1 ranking (tied with UCLA and Wisconsin) in the latest U.S. News and World Report ranking of more than 200 graduate programs.
- May 13, 2004 Childhood conduct problems may predict depression among young adults
- January 11, 2001 Chances of children experiencing problems following divorce depend on mother's parenting style, child's temperament
- Lengua, L. J., Ruberry, E. J., McEntire, C., Klein, M., & Jones, B. (2018). Preliminary Evaluation of an Innovative, Brief Parenting Program Designed to Promote Self-Regulation in Parents and Children. Mindfulness.
- Thompson, S. F., Zalewski, M., Kiff, C. J., Lengua, L. J. (2018). A state-trait model of cortisol in early childhood: Contextual and parental predictors of stable and time-varying effects. Hormones and Behavior, 98, 198-209. doi: 10.1016/j.yhbeh.2017.12.009. PMID: 29305885
- Ruberry, E. J., Klein, M. R., Kiff, C. J., Thompson, S. F., Lengua, L. J. (2017). Parenting as a moderator of the effects of cumulative risk on children's social–emotional adjustment and academic readiness. Infant and Child Development, 27. DOI: 10.1002/icd.2071
- Moran, L., Lengua, L. J., Zalewski, M., Ruberry, E., Klein, M., Thompson, S., Kiff, C. (2016). Variable- and Person-Centered Approaches to Examining Temperament Vulnerability and Resilience to the Effects of Contextual Risk. Journal of Research in Personality. DOI: 10.1016/j.jrp.2016.03.003
- Lengua, L. J., Kiff, C. Moran, L. R., Zalewski, M., Thompson, S. F., Cortes, R. & Ruberry, E. (2014). Parenting Mediates the Effects of Income and Cumulative Risk on the Development of Effortful Control. Social Development, 23, 631-649. dx.doi.org/10.1111/sode.12071
- Lengua, L. J., Moran, L. R., Zalewski, M, Ruberry, E, Kiff, C & Thompson, S. (2014). Relations of Growth in Effortful Control to Family Income, Cumulative Risk, and Adjustment in Preschool-age Children. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology. dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10802-014-9941-2
- Lengua, L. J. (2013). Poverty, the Development of Effortful Control, and Children’s Academic, Social and Emotional Adjustment. In V. Maholmes & R. King (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Poverty and Child Development.
- Lengua, L. J. Zalewski, M., Fisher, P., Moran, L. (2012). Does HPA-axis Dysregulation Account for the Effects of Income on Effortful Control and Adjustment in Preschool Children? Infant and Child Development.
- Lengua, L. J., & Wachs, T. D. (2012). Temperament and Risk: Resilient and Vulnerable Responses to Adversity. In M. Zentner & R. Shiner (Eds.), The Handbook of Temperament. Guilford Press.
- Kiff, C., Lengua, L. J., & Zalewski, M. (2011). Nature and nurturing: Parenting in the context of children’s temperament. Journal of Clinica Child and Family Review, 14, 251-301.
- Lengua, L. J. (2008) Anxiousness, frustration, and effortful control as moderators of the relation between parenting and adjustment problems in middle-childhood. Social Development, 17, 554-577.
- Lengua, L. J., Bush, N., Long, A. C., Trancik, A. M., & Kovacs, E. A. (2008). Effortful Control as a Moderator of the Relation between Contextual Risk and Growth in Adjustment Problems. Development & Psychopathology, 20, 509-528.
- Lengua, L. J., Honorado, E., & Bush, N. (2007). Cumulative Risk and Parenting as Predictors of Effortful Control and Social Competence in Preschool Children. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology.
- Lengua, L. J. (2006). Growth in Temperament and Parenting as Predictors of Adjustment During Children_s Transition to Adolescence. Developmental Psychology.
- Lengua, L. J., & Kovacs, E. A. (2005). Bidirectional Associations between Temperament and Parenting, and the Prediction of Adjustment Problems in Middle Childhood. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 26, 21-38.
- Lengua, L. J. (2003). Associations among emotionality, self-regulation, adjustment problems and positive adjustment in middle childhood. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 24, 595-618.
- Lengua, L. J. (2002). The contribution of emotionality and self-regulation to the understanding of children_s response to multiple risk. Child Development, 73, 144-161.