LabCompass

Brooke G. McKenna

Psychology · Purdue University West Lafayette

OpenAlex ORCID
Mid career · publishing since 2015
Child Abuse and TraumaMaternal Mental Health During Pregnancy and PostpartumBirth, Development, and HealthLGBTQ Health, Identity, and PolicyChild and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development

Publications

31

Citations

993

Est. group size

~1

Recurring co-author estimate

Active years

12

Publishing since 2015

Research summary
AI-generated

Brooke G. McKenna studies how childhood trauma and stress, especially experienced by mothers, can be biologically passed on to affect the mental health and development of their children. This work combines psychology with biological markers such as epigenetic aging (chemical changes in DNA linked to stress exposure) and gut microbiome composition to understand how adversity shapes health across generations, often focusing on Black American and South African populations. The research also touches on racial discrimination, health inequities, and intervention approaches like trauma-sensitive yoga for trauma survivors.

Intergenerational transmission of trauma and stressEpigenetics and biological aging related to adversityMaternal and infant mental healthRacial discrimination and health inequitiesChild and adolescent psychopathology

Publication output peaked around 2020 with a burst of 9 papers, declined through 2023-2024, and has picked up again in 2025-2026, suggesting an uneven but recently renewed pace of output.

Generated by claude-sonnet-5 from public bibliographic data · Jul 20, 2026

Publication cadence
Publications per year over the last 10 years — averaging 2.8/year recently
172018: 2 publications182019: 1 publication192020: 9 publications9202021: 4 publications212022: 5 publications222023: 2 publications232024: 1 publication242025: 3 publications252026: 3 publications26
Recent publications
Publishes in
  • Nature Communications×3
  • Biological Psychiatry×3
  • Development and Psychopathology×2
  • Neuron×1
  • Biological Psychiatry Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging×1
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This profile was generated automatically from public scholarly data (OpenAlex). Group size and activity levels are estimates derived from co-authorship patterns.

Last updated Jul 20, 2026.

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