Leigha Rose Waikel

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Graduate Student, Clinical Program

Leigha (she/her) is currently a trauma-track intern at the VA Maryland Healthcare System/University of Maryland Consortium and a doctoral candidate in the clinical program. Her research interests lie at the intersection of personality, externalizing psychopathology, and sucide risk, including:

  •  Advancing the conceptualization, assessment, and prevention of suicide by leveraging dimensional models of personality and psychopathology (e.g., the Five Factor Model, the Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology). 
  • Applying longitudinal modeling techniques to capture the dynamic interactions between personality, cognitive-affective, and interpersonal processes from which suicidal thoughts and behaviors emerge. These include multilevel modeling, latent growth modeling, and continuous-time dynamic curve modeling. 
  • Examining the role of externalizing traits (e.g., antagonism, impulsivity) and states (e.g., acute negative affect, anger, aggression) in the development of suicidal thoughts and behaviors. 

Leigha uses open science practices to strengthen the transparency and replicability of her work, including preregistration, registered reports, and open sharing of materials, code, and data whenever possible. She has also been involved in meta-science projects aimed at improving the robustness of psychological science.

 Note: I publish as Leigha Rose.

View my website here.

View my OSF page here.

Dissertation/Thesis Title:
Thesis Title: Validity, stability, and change in psychopathic traits in older adults: A registered report (Clinical Psychological Science, 2025)
Comps Title: Associations between psychopathy and suicide: A meta-analytic review (Personality Disorders: Theory, Research, & Treatment, 2025)
Dissertation Title: Longitudinal stability and predictors of suicidal thoughts and behaviors in older adults: The importance of personality (revise and resubmit, Clinical Psychological Science)
Articles Featuring Leigha Rose Waikel

Psychology graduate students Leigha Rose Waikel and Nate Phillips were recently honored with Emerging…