Please join us in welcoming Kristina Gordon as the new Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and Engagement in the College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences. Gordon comes to us from the Department of Psychology at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, where she was director of clinical training. Gordon studies developing and maintaining relationship health; brief couple interventions; impact of relationships on physical and emotional health; relationship traumas (e.g., infidelity, IPV) and forgiveness.
Kristi Gordon
Gordon received her PhD in clinical psychology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and completed her clinical psychology internship at the Brown University Consortium. She was a College of Arts and Sciences Excellence Professor and former Director of Clinical Training in the Department of Psychology at the University of Tennessee. She recently completed two large federal grants, one of which implemented a brief relationship intervention with a primarily low-income population and the other of which investigated a couples-based smoking cessation intervention with Latino couples expecting a baby. She is currently working on a project funded by the Templeton Foundation that connects churches, community agencies, and the University of Tennessee to deliver empirically supported relationship education to Knoxville couples, as well as an NSF funded SmartHealth technology grant to reduce stress in caregivers of dementia patients. She is the co-author of two books on how to help couples recover following infidelity published by Guilford Press (one for the lay public and a companion book for therapists), and of numerous articles on forgiveness, infidelity, and treating couple distress. She was elected a Fellow in APA’s Society for Couple and Family Psychology and was recently President of that Division. She also serves on the editorial board for the Journal of Family Psychology, Family Process, and Couple and Family Psychology: Research and Practice. Her work regarding infidelity has been cited in national media outlets such as the New York Times, USA Today, Psychology Today, Men’s Health, Fatherly.com, OZY.com, and in regional and local TV and news media. In addition to her research, teaching, and service activities, she also maintains a private practice in Knoxville, TN. Finally, her most important role is wife to a very patient husband and mom to two wonderful daughters.