Principal Investigator:
Dr. Pamela Keel
she/her/hers
Pamela K. Keel, Ph.D., is Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor and Director of the Eating Behaviors Research Clinic in the Department of Psychology at Florida State University. She received her A.B. in Anthropology summa cum laude from Harvard University in 1992, Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Minnesota in 1998 and completed her clinical psychology internship at Duke University Medical Center in 1998. Dr. Keel has received grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for her research on the nosology, biology, epidemiology, and longitudinal course of bulimic syndromes. In addition, Dr. Keel is co-Principal Investigator and co-Director of the NIMH-funded Integrated Clinical Neuroscience Training Program at Florida State University. She currently serves on the editorial boards of the International Journal of Eating Disorders and Eating Disorders, and is a past Associate Editor for the Journal of Abnormal Psychology, and was a standing member of a grant review panel for the NIH Center for Scientific Review. Dr. Keel was elected as a Fellow of the Academy for Eating Disorders in 2006, Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science in 2013, and Fellow of the American Psychological Association in 2014. She served as President for the Eating Disorders Research Society in 2009-2010 and President for the Academy for Eating Disorders in 2013-2014 and received the Leadership Award in Research from the Academy for Eating Disorders in 2019.
Graduate Students:
Sarrah Ali
she/her/hers
Sarrah received her B.S. in Psychology from the University of California San Diego in 2016. Since joining the clinical psychology Ph.D. program at FSU in Fall 2021, Sarrah’s research has focused on better understanding psychosocial factors that contribute to the development and maintenance of eating pathology, with a specific interest in the impact of ethnoracial group membership. Her work aims to 1) identify overlooked differences in eating pathology among ethnoracial groups, and 2) uncover mechanisms responsible for these differences. Sarrah has presented independent research at international conferences including the International Conference on Eating Disorders (ICED) and the Eating Disorder Research Society (EDRS) meeting. She has published research in multiple journals including the Journal of Psychopathology and Clinical Science and the International Journal of Eating Disorders. Sarrah plans to continue researching eating disorders across ethnoracial groups to contribute to a comprehensive understanding of these serious conditions as a faculty member at a research university where she will direct her own lab and mentor graduate students.
Alejandra Medina Fernandez
she/her/hers
Alejandra received her B.S. in Psychology (Clinical Track, Honors) with a minor in Statistics at the University of Central Florida in May 2024. During her undergraduate years, she completed a senior honors thesis examining the moderated mediating role of body image and exercise motivation in the association between exercise frequency and romantic relationship satisfaction. She also co-authored projects focused on body image and loss-of-control eating (LOCE) across diverse populations. Since joining the clinical psychology program at FSU in Fall 2024, Alejandra has presented independent research at international conferences, including the International Conference of Eating Disorders (ICED), with travel funded by the Academy of Eating Disorders’ Student/Early Career Investigator/Clinical Trainee Travel Scholarship, as well as the Eating Disorder Research Society (EDRS). Alejandra has published a first-author paper using data from her honors thesis and has another under review that examines how social media influences the relationship between peer influence and disordered eating in adults. Alejandra's research interests center on understanding psychosocial factors associated with eating pathology, with particular attention to social media, body image, and, more recently, weight suppression. Additionally, Alejandra is interested in examining how the influence of these factors varies across demographic groups.
Holly Spinner
she/her/hers
Holly received her B.S. in Psychology summa cum laude from Penn State University in 2022 where she worked in Dr. Kenneth Levy's and Dr. Pamela Cole's labs as an undergraduate research assistant. She worked as a behavioral research coordinator in Dr. Marian Tanofsky-Kraff's lab at Uniformed Services University in Bethesda, Maryland prior to beginning her graduate studies at Florida State in Fall 2024. In her time at Florida State, Holly has presented original research at international conferences including the Eating Disorders Research Society and the International Conference on Eating Disorders. Additionally, she was awarded the Russell and Eugenia Morcom Graduate Research Day Excellence Award for her presentation on the predictive validity of purging disorder in April 2025. Holly is passionate about understanding the underlying mechanisms of eating disorder development from adolescence through adulthood. She is also interested in how emotion regulation, suicidality, and family dynamics relate to disordered eating.
Ziyu (Ivan) Zhao
he/him
Ziyu (Ivan) Zhao received his B.A. in Psychology with honors, minoring in statistics, and B.S. in Public Relations from Boston University in 2023. In his undergraduate years, Ivan examined sex differences in the associations between weight discrimination and disordered eating among veterans. After college, Ivan joined Mass General Hospital Multidisciplinary Eating Disorder Research Collaborative, where he gained experience in assessment and in utilizing fMRI in participants with Anorexia Nervosa. Since joining FSU’s clinical psychology program in Fall 2024, Ivan's research has focused on defining the construct of maladaptive exercise and examining its association with eating pathology through longitudinal modeling. Ivan has presented original research at international conferences and published one empirical article examining the predictive validity of forms of maladaptive exercise in the International Journal of Eating Disorders. Ivan aims to develop a research program focusing on reward mechanisms underlying maladaptive exercise and eating pathology using a bio-behavioral approach.
Project Coordinator:
Harmony Vides-Varini
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Harmony received her B.S. in Psychology summa cum laude from Florida State University in May 2023. After learning about Dr. Keel’s ED research during her study abroad course “Eating Disorders in London”, Harmony joined the Eating Behaviors Research Clinic as an undergrad research assistant in Fall 2022. In 2023, she was promoted to oversee Dr. Keel's study: Eating Disorders Across Genders, Generations, and Adult Development Stages (AGGA) as Project Coordinator and Manager of the Eating Behaviors Research Clinic. Harmony is broadly interested in the effects of ethnoracial status on eating pathology across developmental stages. Additionally, given her dance background, she is interested in developmental and environmental factors contributing to disordered eating in competitive athletes. In the future, she will pursue a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology.
Research Assistant:
Taylor Politi
she/her/hers
Taylor graduated from Florida State University in Fall 2023 with a B.S. in Psychology and a minor in Child Development. After taking Dr. Keel’s “Eating Disorders in London” class while studying abroad, she joined the Eating Behaviors Research Clinic as an undergraduate research assistant in 2022. She currently works on Dr. Keel's Eating Disorders Across Genders, Generations, and Adult Development Stages (AGGA) study as a post-baccalaureate Research Assistant and Clinical Interviewer. Taylor will be pursuing a PhD in Clinical Psychology starting in Fall 2025, where she aims to study the social and behavioral factors that sustain eating disorders, with a focus on body image disturbances, maladaptive exercise, and weight stigma in athletes and diverse populations.
Undergraduate Senior Honors Thesis:
Isabella Cerase
Isabella is a junior at Florida State University majoring in Psychology with a minor in Women’s Studies. She joined the Keel Lab in the Fall of 2023 to gain further experience in eating disorders research after her interest in the topic sparked while conducting her own study on body image and social media among adolescent girls as part of a research class in high school. In Fall 2024, under the direction of Dr. Keel, she started her Honor Thesis focused on Instagram trends and their potential impact in inoculating from the negative body image effects of social media use. In the future, Isabella plans to pursue a PhD in social psychology.
InternFSU:
Erin Orlando
Erin is a senior at Florida State University, double majoring in Psychology and Studio Art with focus areas in drawing and painting. She joined the Keel lab as a DIS student in May of 2024 to gain hands-on experience in the conduction of eating disorder research. After a year in the Keel lab, she adopted the role of Research Assistant Intern in Fall of 2025 through the InternFSU program. Additionally, Erin is involved in a variety of campus organizations and nonprofits such as Realizing Everyone’s Need for Emotional Wellness (RENEW), If You’re Reading This FSU, Opening Minds Through Art (OMA), and the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders (ANAD) FSU. After graduation, Erin aspires to seek higher education in pursuit of becoming a clinical mental health counselor.