Dr. Diana Tajik-Parvinchi

Education

Courses

• Developmental Psychology: Infant and Child (PSY-223)
• Research Methods: Experimental Design (PSY-230)
• Social Psychology (PSY-255)
• Personality (PSY-315)
• Abnormal Psychology (PSY-321)
• The Psychology of Health and Well-Being (PSY-327 (HSC/KPE-327))
• Cognitive Psychology (PSY-332)

About

Diana Parvinchi joined Redeemer as a Sessional Assistant Professor of Psychology in 2023. She completed her PhD at York University examining eye movement patterns in children with Tourette Syndrome and its comorbid conditions of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. 

Following her graduate work, she joined a group of researchers and clinician at SickKids Hospital. She took lead on a private/public-initiated project between a commercial partner, the Ontario Brain Institute (OBI), and SickKids Hospital. The major aim of her research at SickKids was to apply cognitive training methods to develop a software-based intervention program for children with ADHD. Following this work at SickKids, she was awarded the Lawson fellowship at McMaster University, where she began work in functional imaging and focused on research concerning the relationship between brain structures, function, and cognition in children with disabilities such as those with autism and cerebral palsy. From 2017-2019, she worked at York University and her primary endeavor focused on the delivery and supervision of a large CIHR funded randomized clinical trial on a Cognitive Behaviour Therapy based emotion regulation intervention. Following the successful completion of this project, she continued her research at McMaster University at CanChild examining the validity of a tool aimed at classifying social communication in children and youth with autism (the Autism Classification System of Functioning: Social Communication; ACSF:SC). Her most recent work has been on resiliency in children and youth with disabilities at Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital.

Research Interests

My research interests broadly encompass the investigation of neural, cognitive, and socio-emotional mechanisms underlying behavior, with a focus on their application in intervention research. My research can be described as two-fold: one aspect involves understanding the interconnections among these domains, while the other is dedicated to utilizing this knowledge to develop strategies and inform intervention and support programs.

A large focus of my research is on the health and wellbeing of persons with disabilities. Many youths with disabilities experience internalizing and externalizing behavioural symptoms, at rates higher than peers without neurodevelopmental conditions. Our recent work (Tajik-Parvinchi et al., 2021) demonstrates that impairments in cognition (domain general top-down information processing) predicts increased maladaptive emotion regulation (e.g., worry), which is a full mediator to both internalizing (e.g. anxiety and depression) and externalizing problems (e.g. hyperactivity, conduct behaviour). Many individuals with disabilities experience unnecessarily poor outcomes in education, quality of life, and other areas due to unmet needs. Existing interventions result in positive outcomes only in a subset of youth with disabilities. My research is concerned about implementation of research findings to improve existing interventions and also contributing to design and development of new interventions to better meet the needs of youth with disabilities.

My neuroimaging interest has mainly involved resting state functional connectivity associated with cognition and emotion (e.g., self-regulation, emotion regulation). My research objective in this context for the next few years would be on gaining greater understanding of the neural correlates of resiliency and its link to self-regulation with a special interest in emotion regulation.

Recent Publications

Tajik-Parvinchi, D., Pinto, M., Lewis, I., King, G (in press). An Umbrella Review of the Characteristics of Resiliency-Enhancing Interventions for Children and Youth with Disabilities. Disability and Rehabilitation.

Tajik-Parvinchi, D., Kingsnorth, S., King, G (2023). Benefits of Residential Immersive Life Skills Programs: A prospective study of autonomy and self-efficacy gains and sex differences in youth with disability. Disability and Rehabilitation.

Tajik-Parvinchi, DJ., Black, K.R., Roudbarani, F., Weiss, J. A., King, G. (2023). Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) in Typical and Atypical Brain Development: Challenges and suggestions. In Bonnie Halpern-Felsher (Editor-in-Chief). Encyclopedia of Child and Adolescent Health, Section on Brain Development. 1: 4-13. Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA, USA

Tajik-Parvinchi, D., Rosenbaum, P., Hidecker, M., Duku, E., Zwaigenbaum, L., Roncadin, C., Georgiades, S., Gentles, S., Fang, H., Di Rezze, B. (2021). Construct Validity of the Autism Classification System of Functioning: Social Communication (ACSF:SC) Across Childhood and Adolescence. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-022-05608-w

Tajik‐Parvinchi, D., Farmus, L., Tablon Modica, P., Cribbie, R. A., & Weiss, J. A. (2021). The Role of Cognitive Control and Emotion Regulation in Predicting Mental Health Problems in Children with Neurodevelopmental Disorders. Child: Care, Health and Development.

Tajik-Parvinchi, D., Hidecker, M.J.C., Selvakumaran, S., Lloyd, F., Batth, S., Fang, H., Ross, B, Curtis, A., Stone, A. C.,Reed, R., Kunitz, C., Ostlund, A., Snyder, H., McMillan, L., Adams, H., Verosky, V., Di Rezze, B. (2021). Operationalizing Social Communication in Autism Research: A scoping review over 20 years. Current Developmental Disorders Reports

Tajik-Parvinchi, DJ., Davis, AD, Roth, S., Hall, GB., Rosenbaum, P., Hopmans, SN., & Gorter, JW.
(2020). Functional Connectivity and Quality of Life in Young Adults with Cerebral Palsy: A Feasibility Study. BMC Neurology, 20:388

Tajik-Parvinchi, DJ., Farmus, L., Cribbie, R., Albaum, C., Weiss, J. A. (2020). Clinical and Parental Predictors of Emotion Regulation Following Cognitive Behaviour Therapy in Children with Autism. Autism: The International Journal of Research and Practice, 24(4): 851-866.

Tajik-Parvinchi, DJ., Davis, AD, Roth, S., Hall, GB., Rosenbaum, P., Hopmans, SN., & Gorter, JW. (2020). Functional Connectivity and Quality of Life in Young Adults with Cerebral Palsy: A Feasibility Study. BMC Neurology, 20:388

Farmus, L., Weiss, J., Tajik-Parvinchi, D., & Cribbie, R. A. (2020). Contextualizing Statistical Suppression Within Pretest-Posttest Designs. The Quantitative Methods for Psychology, 16 (1): 21-32.