3cisd

3C Institute

3-C Institute for Social Development Sees Record Growth

Thriving business adds staff and moves to bigger offices

CARY, NC (January 27, 2009) – 3-C Institute for Social Development (ISD) announces the award of over $3 million dollars in new grants, a major expansion of its operations and accompanying move to new offices.

3-C ISD is a research company that creates scientifically validated intervention and assessment tools for parents and professionals who wish to help children build positive peer relations and develop social coping skills. Much of the research is directed at helping address significant societal problems such as school violence, bullying, and social deficits of children and adolescents.

Most of the new funding was awarded by the National Institutes of Health in the form of SBIR grants and contracts.  The funds support a broad range of cutting edge research and technology development efforts such as:

  • Creating school-based programs that will help reduce behavioral health disparities among Hispanic and African-American youth by sharing stories of their respective cultural heritages.
  • Developing a web-based networking site that will provide online access to training, educational, and career development programs for research professionals in the child and adolescent mental health intervention and services markets.
  • Developing and testing a social skills training curriculum specifically for children with high functioning autism (HFA) disorders.

In addition, several new staff members were hired to support the new business.  New hires continue to be made in the research, software engineering and graphic design divisions.

To accommodate the growth in research and development projects, 3C-ISD has moved into newly renovated offices.  In addition to more than doubling their previous square footage, 3-C ISD has outfitted the new space with ‘green’ technology enhancements including lights controlled by motion sensors, water saving fixtures in the restrooms, wireless connectivity, smart boards and a high efficiency HVAC system.

“We’re very excited about our growth and what these new grants mean,” said Dr. Melissa DeRosier, President of 3-C ISD. “We are expanding our use of technology to teach life skills, addressing the rapidly growing population of children diagnosed with autism, and reaching previously underserved populations.”

BLOG

SIGN UP FOR OUR NEWSLETTER

    Let's Talk

    Learn more about 3C Institute.
    News

    DEB CHILDRESS, PHD

    Chief of Research and Learning Content

    BIOGRAPHY

    Dr. Childress obtained her PhD in psychology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Prior to coming to 3C Institute, she served as a research associate and a postdoctoral fellow in the Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill working on a longitudinal imaging study aimed at identifying the early markers of autism through behavioral and imaging methodologies. She has 19 years of autism research experience, during which she has examined the behavioral, personality, and cognitive characteristics of individuals with autism and their family members. Dr. Childress also has experience developing behavioral and parent report measurement tools, coordinating multi-site research studies, and collecting data from children and families. She has taught courses and seminars in general child development, autism, and cognitive development at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

    Expertise

    • autism
    • early development
    • behavioral measurement
    • integrating behavioral and biological measurement

    Education

    • Postdoctoral fellowship, Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities (Institutional NRSA-NICHD), University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
    • PhD, developmental psychology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
    • BS, psychology (minor in sociology), University of Iowa

    Selected Publications

    • Elison, J. T., Wolff, J. J., Heimer, D. C., Paterson, S. J., Gu, H., Hazlett, H. C., Styner, M, Gerig, G., & Piven, J. (in press). Frontolimbic neural circuitry at 6 months predicts individual differences in joint attention at 9 months. Developmental Science.
    • Wassink, T. H., Vieland, V. J., Sheffield, V. C., Bartlett, C. W., Goedken, R., Childress, D. & Piven, J. (2008). Posterior probability of linkage analysis of autism dataset identifies linkage to chromosome 16. Psychiatric Genetics,18(2),85-91.
    • Losh, M., Childress, D., Lam K. & Piven, J. (2008). Defining key features of the broad autism phenotype: A comparison across parents of multiple- and single-incidence autism families. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 147B(4):424-33.
    • Wassink, T. H., Piven, J., Vieland, V. J., Jenkins, L., Frantz R., Bartlett, C. W., Goedken, R., … Sheffield, V.C. (2005). Evaluation of the chromosome 2q37.3 gene CENTG2 as an autism susceptibility gene. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 136, 36-44.
    • Barrett, S., Beck, J., Bernier, R., Bisson, E., Braun, T., Casavant, T., Childress, D., … Vieland, V. (1999). An autosomal genomic screen for autism. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 88, 609-615. doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1096-8628(19991215)88:63.0.CO;2-L
    • Piven, J., Palmer, P., Landa, R., Santangelo, S., Jacobi, D. & Childress, D. (1997). Personality and language characteristics in parents from multiple-incidence autism families. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 74, 398-411.
    • Piven, J., Palmer, P., Jacobi, D., Childress, D. & Arndt, S. (1997). Broader autism phenotype: Evidence from a family history study of multiple-incidence autism families. American Journal of Psychiatry, 154, 185-190.