Yael R
- Research Program Mentor
PhD at Indiana University at Bloomington
Expertise
sexuality education; research; somatic work; women's health; LGBTQIA+ health; social determinants of health; organizing/equity work/leadership skills/social change work; (experience with comparative literature, Spanish as a language, and publishing)
Bio
I have taught courses related to equity, social justice, research, and the human experience: (1) Becoming an Effective Leader for Social Change, (2) Social Justice and Faith Communities (3) Human Sexuality, and (4) Practicum in College Sex Education (a course for teaching undergrads how to teach sex education), and (5) Understanding Research (a research methods course). I have developed and facilitated curriculum related to organizing, liberation, and community work with anti-racist values for the CUNY DEI Incubator, work as a sex educator and coach, and have a PhD in Health Behavior. My strengths as a researcher lie in qualitative research including conducting and analyzing interviews, focus groups, qualitative survey data, and image-based content analysis; and facilitating participatory action research projects. My research interests, which reflect my personal interests, focus on the nuances of identity and power in work centered around consent, desire, pleasure, embodiment, identity, agency, sex, and partnering styles. I am a passionate salsa dancer, love traveling, reading, and trying to be crafty/artistic. I’ve lived in four countries and multiple places in the US and own my own business!Project ideas
Practicing Boundaries at x school
Developing the ability to set and respect boundaries is a vital social skill that often is neglected within formal education spaces. In this study, we are going to survey students at X high school about their knowledge and use of different types of boundaries (emotional, physical, material, etc.). We will then introduce students to a curriculum focused on supporting individuals in identifying, setting, sharing, and respecting boundaries. After two weeks, participants will receive a second survey about their knowledge and use of different types of boundaries (emotional, physical, material, etc.). At this time, participants will be invited to participate in an interview to discuss these topics further. We will use this information to measure the success of our intervention and to finalize a shareable curriculum that will include quotations and findings from our study.
Fetishization in inter-ethnic and inter-racial relationships
We will interview a diverse group of people who have been fetishized by current or past partners about their experience with this phenomenon to create a narrative project. This project will include photos (or illustrations), sound bytes from the interviews, and quotations. It will live on social media where we will start with introducing the project and summarizing the findings before sharing pieces of the interviews. We seek not only to document what people are experiencing and how they think others can do better, but also to share this information widely so that (1) people can feel validated in their experiences and (2) so solutions can be shared broadly.