Research Description
Teaching Interests:
• Interpersonal Practice with Children and Families
• Trauma-Informed Child Welfare Practice
• Emerging Adulthood
• Human Behavior and the Social Environment
Biography
Megan Hayes Piel joined the WSU School of Social Work faculty in 2015. She received her Ph.D. from Arizona State University and was a Doris Duke Fellow for the Promotion of Child Well-Being. Her research focuses on the intersection of child welfare and behavioral health, with attention to foster youth and transitions to adulthood.
Dr. Piel’s experience in social work settings includes providing interventions and program supervision for youth and emerging adults in behavioral health and foster care group homes and schools. The scope of her work is inherently interdisciplinary as it focuses on intervention with vulnerable populations involved in multiple service systems
Areas of Expertise:
SUBSTANTIVE AREA EXPERTISE
• Child welfare
• Foster care
• Transitions to adulthood
• Psychiatric medications and youth
• Intergenerational transmission of abuse and neglect
METHODS EXPERTISE
• Community-based intervention research
• Behavior analytic methods
• Qualitative data analysis
• Quantitative data analysis