Institute for Families in Society

Child, Youth, and Family Research

The Institute’s Child, Youth, and Family Research (CYFR) team works to advance evidence-based practices and policies to enhance the lives of children, youth, and families, particularly among underserved populations. Strong relationships with a range of child and family serving agencies and organizations support efforts to educate, understand and improve behavioral health outcomes for children, youth, and their families.

Cheri Shapiro, PhD, is currently a Research Associate Professor and Director of the Institute for Families in Society in the College of Social Work at the University of South Carolina. Dr. Shapiro received her B.A. in Psychology from Florida State University, and her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Arizona. As part of her doctoral training, Dr. Shapiro completed a one-year clinical internship at the University of Minnesota Hospital and Clinics, where she received specialty training in both Pediatric Psychology and Clinical Child Psychology. She began her career as Director of Psychology at a rural health center in Marana, Arizona, while also serving families as a psychologist at a child-serving organization in Tucson, Arizona. Dr. Shapiro then became the Project Coordinator of the Pittsburgh site of the federally-funded Multimodal Treatment Study of Children with ADHD (MTA Study). After a relocation to New York, she then became Director of the Psychological Services Center at SUNY Buffalo, and later became Director of Consultation and Evaluation Services at the South Carolina Department of Juvenile Justice. A strong desire to shift to prevention science led to a position as Project Director for the federally-funded U.S. Triple P System Trial, and Principal Investigator (PI) of the Family Networks Project, one of four projects funded by the National Quality Improvement Center on Early Childhood. In 2011, Dr. Shapiro joined the Institute for Families in Society, and continued as PI on a range of projects designed to support implementation of evidence-based parenting/family interventions in real world settings. Dr. Shapiro became permanent Director of IFS in 2019 and in January of 2020 was named as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Child and Family Studies.

An active researcher, Dr. Shapiro has served as the lead Principal Investigator (PI) on multiple translational research and evaluation projects, and has authored over 30 peer-reviewed journal articles, 11 book chapters, and has presented her scholarly work at more than 40 professional meetings.