Loreto Leiva, PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Chile

Dr. Loreto Leiva, PhD, is Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Chile and the director of the Master’s Degree Program in Community Psychology. 

Dr. Leiva’s major research interest has been learning how psychosocial interventions are capable of promoting positive mental health trajectories in contexts of high vulnerability, and how to moderate the detrimental effects of negative social factors. As part of this work, she has established collaborative relationships with academic teams from several other countries, with plans to increase this international approach in the years to come.  Dr. Leiva co-leads an RCT evaluation of a national school-based mental health program called Skills for Life in collaboration with senior officials from the Department of Education in Chile and a research team from Massachusetts General Hospital and the Harvard Medical School. The program’s aim is to add components that study the implementation and fidelity of the program, as well as its psychological and academic impact, in order to capture aspects of the intervention that would not be identified in the experimental design.  She received her PhD from the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile.