Yoonsun Choi is a Professor and Chair of the Doctoral Program at the University of Chicago Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice. Her fields of special interest include minority youth development, particularly Asian Americans, and the roles of race, ethnicity, and culture in youth development. Professor Choi's research seeks to understand the familial and environmental processes that influence and impact ethnic minority children and their development and serves to inform the development of age- and culturally appropriate preventive interventions. Funded by the National Institute of Health and the Russell Sage Foundation, she has conducted a series of interrelated research projects to identify the multiple developmental trajectories of Asian American youth and the factors that predominate in the determination of these outcomes. Professor Choi has been leading the Midwest Longitudinal Study of Asian American Families (MLSAAF), a longitudinal survey following about 800 Asian American families (Filipino Americans and Korean Americans) since 2014 to examines Asian American adolescent and young adult development. This study is particularly interested in the role of culture in family (such as culturally unique family processes, parent-child cultural conflicts), racial prejudice and discrimination, ethnic identity, and culture change and formation (acculturation) that may all be unique issues for this target group as well as other ethnic and immigrant youth.
