Jonathan Kanter, Ph.D.
Research Associate Professor
(206) 221-2591
Advising:
Accepting new graduate students in 2026-2027.
Areas:
Adult Clinical
Interests: Racism, microaggressions, psychotherapy, health equity, contextual behavioral science
Research
I am a research associate professor in psychology in the Adult Clinical program and the Director of EDI Training and Education for UW Medicine, in the Office of Healthcare Equity. My research has spanned how to improve relationships, including therapist-client relationships and relationships across differences, racism and microaggressions, Behavioral Activation for depression, and how to improve EDI training to be more effective. I am looking for students interested in equity issues in clinical psychology and healthcare systems.
Education
University of Washington (2002)
- September 28, 2021 Katherine Manbeck received a dissertation research award from the NIH Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
- April 2, 2021 Jonathan Kanter was a recipient of one of the UW Population Health Initiative’s pandemic grants featured in this UW News article.
- September 30, 2020 Jonathan Kanter writes about microaggressions and racial bias in this article in The Conversation.
- August 19, 2020 Jonathan Kanter is quoted in this Seattle Met article about COVID-19 and the Seattle Freeze
- August 4, 2020 Jonathan Kanter’s studies on loneliness are featured in this NPR article on loneliness during the pandemic
- 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 10, 2020 Jonathan Kanter, Adam Kuczynski, and Edwin Lindo co-authored this opinion piece in the Seattle Times about stressors on marginalized communities
- May 22, 2020 The Population Health Initiative granted awards for COVID-19 rapid response to twenty one faculty-led teams, representing ten different schools. Two of the teams were from UW Psychology professors: Jonathan Kanter and Susan Collins
- April 29, 2020 Jonathan Kanter is featured in this Seattle Met article about Virtual Happy Hours.
- April 25, 2020 Adam Kuczynski and Jonathan Kanter are featured in this National Geographic article about the psychological stresses of isolation.
- April 22, 2020 Adam Kuczynski and Jonathan Kanter’s social distancing study has become a national effort to help cope with the crisis. You can read more about it in this UW News story.
- March 25, 2020 Jonathan Kanter was interviewed on WBUR, a Boston NPR station on “How To Stay Resilient and Mentally Healthy During the Coronavirus Outbreak.”
- March 20, 2020 Jonathan Kanter and Adam Kuczynski explain why it is important for people to still have human connection, while maintaining social distancing and isolation
- March 18, 2020 Jonathan Kanter and Nicole McNichols explain why it is important to maintain human connection while social distancing, in this UW News story
- September 9, 2019 Jonathan Kanter featured in this Right as Rain article on Microaggressions.
- March 22, 2019 Congratulations to Katherine Manbeck, a student of Jonathan Kanter, who was just offered a position with the Institute of Translational Health Sciences (ITHS) in the TL1 Program!
- January 10, 2019 Jonathan Kanter’s study of discussions between political conservatives and liberals is examined in this Seattle times article.
- October 6, 2017 Jonathan Kanter was interviewed by KUOW on his research on microaggressions and racism.
- September 20, 2017 Watch Jonathan Kanter get interviewed on King 5 News on the subject of microaggressions and racist beliefs.
- September 8, 2017 Jonathan Kanter published a study finding that students who deliver microaggressions are also likely to harbor racist attitudes.
- Parigoris, R., Wallace, E., Rosen, D. C., & Kanter, J. W. (2025). The nature of racial microaggressions in white adults: A community sample validation of the cultural cognitions and actions scale. Race and Social Problems. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12552-025-09438-0
- Kuczynski, A. M., Piccirillo, M. L., Dora, J., Kuehn, K. S., Halvorson, M. A., King, K. M., & Kanter, J. W. (2024). Characterizing the momentary association between loneliness, depression, and social interactions: Insights from an ecological momentary assessment study. Journal of Affective Disorders, 360, 376-386.
- Santos, M. M., Nagy, G. A., Kanter, J. W., & López, S. R. (2021). Applying a process-oriented model of cultural competence to behavioral activation for depression. Cognitive and Behavioral Practice, 28(2), 127-146. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cbpra.2020.11.007
- Kanter, J. W., Kuczynski, A. M., Manbeck, K. E., Corey, M. D., & Wallace, E. C. (2020). An integrative contextual behavioral model of intimate relations. Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science, 18, 75-91. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcbs.2020.09.001
- Kanter, J. W., Williams, M. T., Kuczynski, A. M., Corey, M. D., Parigoris, R. M., Carey, C. M., ... & Rosen, D. C. (2020). The measurement and structure of microaggressive communications by white people against Black people. Race and Social Problems, 12(4), 323-343. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12552-020-09298-w
- Kanter, J.W., Rosen, D.C., Manbeck, K.E., Branstetter, H. M. L., Kuczynski, A. M., Corey, M. D., Maitland, D. W. M., & Williams, M. T. (2020). Addressing microaggressions in racially charged patient-provider interactions: a pilot randomized trial. BMC Medical Education, 20, 88. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-020-02004-9
- Williams, M. T., Kanter, J. W., Peña, A., Ching, T. H., & Oshin, L. (2020). Reducing microaggressions and promoting interracial connection: The racial harmony workshop. Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science, 16, 153-161. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcbs.2020.04.008
- Rosen, D. C., Kuczynski, A. M., & Kanter, J. W. (2018). The Antisemitism-Related Stress Inventory: Development and preliminary psychometric evaluation. Psychology of Violence, 8(6), 726-734.
- Puspitasari, A. J., Kanter, J. W., Busch, A. M., Manos, R., Cahill, S., Martell, C., & Koerner, K. (2017). A randomized controlled trial of an online, modular, active learning training program for Behavioral Activation for depression. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 85(8), 814-825. https://doi.org/10.1037/ccp0000223
- Santos, M. M., Nagy, G. A., Hurtado, G. D., West, P., Santiago-Rivera, A, Lee, J., & Kanter, J. W. (2017). Acculturative stress as a moderator of treatment engagement and retention in Behavioral Activation and treatment as usual for Latinos with depression. Journal of Latina/o Psychology, 5(4), 275-289. https://doi.org/10.1037/lat0000074