The Center for Family Research expands horizons with new director at the helm
In September, the Center for Family Research officially became the Center for Community and Family Research (CFR), opening the door to new opportunities.
For over 40 years, CFR has been home to groundbreaking research on the role of families in lifespan human development and health; as well as better understanding the impact of stressors of particular concern to Black families in rural Georgia, such as racism, limited infrastructure and economic opportunity, and multi-generational poverty. An interdisciplinary team of researchers have studied individuals and their families across many years and have developed programs to help individuals and their families thrive even when life gets tough.
CFR is now broadening its scope to better understand families and the communities that support them. Not only will this allow the Center to study how a community’s strengths can help increase family resilience, but it will also provide a new way for CFR to address the sources of health disparities in Georgia.
“Families don’t exist in isolation. We are embedded in neighborhoods, healthcare systems and school systems,” said Sierra Carter, an Associate Professor of psychology and the new director of CFR. “We know that these contexts can be an extraordinary source of strength and belonging, and it also can determine who has access to health, opportunity, and safety.”
Sierra Carter named new director of CFR
Not only did CFR’s name change, but its leadership did, too. Carter is now the director of CFR, replacing Steven Beach. In turn, Beach, a Regents’ Professor of Psychology, stepped into the associate director role: a move he stated would allow for “continuity as well as change.”
When deciding on a new director for CFR, Carter was the obvious choice, Beach said. She has a long history of excellence in funded, health-related and community-engaged research as well as the drive to lead CFR to new heights. She earned both her master’s and doctorate degrees at UGA, and during that time, she became familiar with CFR. Subsequently, she took a faculty position at Georgia State University in 2018, where she ran the Health Equity, Agency, Racism and Trauma (HEART) Lab. There, she led projects focused on how stress can negatively impact the physical and mental health of marginalized communities.
Many of her current projects focus on understanding the psychosocial and contextual factors that shape health and development and identifying opportunities to promote well-being across generations.
One such project, Generational Learning to Optimize Wellness (GLOW), follows Black and Latina women through pregnancy and into the early postpartum period to examine how mothers’ experiences may become embedded in both maternal and infant health. Using a mixed-methods approach, GLOW brings together in-depth interviews about women’s pregnancy and healthcare experiences with measures of maternal physiology, fetal development, and newborn neurobehavior. By integrating women’s own narratives with biological and developmental data, the project offers a uniquely rich picture of how experiences during pregnancy may shape health across two generations.
Carter returned to CFR in 2025, bringing extensive experience in interdisciplinary research, community-engaged science, and translating research into meaningful improvements in health and well-being.
Now, she’s more motivated than ever to help others live longer, healthier lives.
“When I came back to the Center, there were just so many wonderful people who have been here 20, 30 years, who are really dedicated to communities living long and well lives,” Carter said. “It shows just how important this work is to this Center. I just wanted to be a part of that journey.”
CFR to grow with new personnel, projects
The future of CFR is bright, with the team already putting new projects into motion. Some of these initiatives involve research into inflammation and longevity, others focus on maternal health, and new ways to deal with trauma. To Carter, it’s incredibly important to think about keeping people healthy from the moment they’re born to the later years of their lives. And now, CFR is looking for more researchers who feel the same way.
CFR offers both extensive longitudinal data sets and opportunities for community engagement to faculty looking to join, Beach said. CFR welcomes researchers from across the social and behavioral sciences and related disciplines. This multidisciplinary approach is critical for solving major issues in society, Carter said.
“Now that we’re expanding our name, we’re also thinking, ‘What are the community-level processes that protect health? What forms of collective care have allowed marginalized communities to survive conditions that were never necessarily designed for their flourishing, but are flourishing despite it?’” Carter said. “We have already documented some of these processes, but I think now we could expand on that.”
Written by: Sydney Barrilleaux
October 5, 2026