Kendall Cotton Bronk, Ph.D., is the Principal Investigator for the Adolescent Moral Development Lab and a Professor of Psychology in the Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences at the Claremont Graduate University. She is a developmental scientist interested in studying and promoting positive youth development and the moral growth of young people. Along with studying character strengths, including humility, gratitude, hope, and patience, she has most commonly investigated young people’s purposes in life.

Her research has explored the relationship between purpose and healthy growth, the ways young people discover purpose, and the developmental trajectory of youth with strong commitments to various purposes in life. Her work has been funded by the Spencer Foundation, the John Templeton Foundation, the Templeton World Charity Foundation, the Templeton Religion Trust, the Walton Family Foundation, and the Fulbright Foundation.

 

Current Projects

Featured
Cultivating Purpose in K-12 Educational Settings
Cultivating Purpose in K-12 Educational Settings

This study seeks to map the landscape of K-12 school-based purpose interventions and to make empirically-based recommendations regarding how these efforts could be scaled more broadly.
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Examining Career and College Planning through the Lens of Purpose in the East and West
Examining Career and College Planning through the Lens of Purpose in the East and West

We are conducting a three-year longitudinal study of career purpose.
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How Do Young Adults Think about Patience and Its Role in the Search for Purpose?: A Qualitative Study Featuring Religious and Non-Religious Individuals
How Do Young Adults Think about Patience and Its Role in the Search for Purpose?: A Qualitative Study Featuring Religious and Non-Religious Individuals

This study seeks to explore the role that patience, conceptualized as the ability to stay calm but actively engaged in the face of frustration or suffering, plays in the search for purpose.
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Character and Virtue Formation among Liberian Youth
Character and Virtue Formation among Liberian Youth

This study seeks to gain a fuller understanding of what positive youth development in the Liberian context entails.
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Understanding and Fostering Family Purpose
Understanding and Fostering Family Purpose

The goal of this study is to advance our understanding of how family purposes develop and how one can promote them, especially among families with extraordinary responsibilities.
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