Vivian L. Tamkin, PhD, is a dual state licensed, community-oriented psychologist (CA and WI), and she is an Assistant Professor of Counseling Psychology at Santa Clara University. Dr. Tamkin holds a PhD in Counseling Psychology and a minor in Child Clinical Psychology from Southern Illinois University, Carbondale (SIUC). She completed a specialized clinical
postdoctoral fellowship in Child Development and Infant Mental Health from the Irving B. Harris Program in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Colorado, Denver, School of Medicine. Dr. Tamkin also completed a mentored research fellowship in the Health Disparities Research Scholars T-32 Training Program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, School of Medicine and Public Health. She is a fellow with the Life Course Research Intervention Network (LCIRN) as well as an alum of the NAPA Parent-Infant Mental Health Fellowship Program.
Clinically, Dr. Tamkin’s practice spans the life course, with an emphasis on community-oriented service. Her graduate level teaching holds an ecological systems framework which threads through to her qualitative research program. Utilizing a multi-method qualitative approach (e.g., in-depth, semi-structured interviews, focus groups, video data), Dr. Tamkin’s target outcome is to operationalize reflective functioning through a culturally attuned lens to better inform the development and implementation of Black/African American maternal and child interventions across the life course. Dr. Tamkin finds it critical to identify pathways which support increased understanding of emotional health and well-being in African American/Black maternal-child dyads.