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Meghan Costello, PhD
Researcher, Clinician, and Teacher
Hi! I am a clinical psychologist and researcher focused on understanding and leveraging positive relationship processes in adolescence. I work alongside teens and their communities - caregivers, peers, schools, and other caring adults - to empower youth and boost connections to formal and informal mental health supports. Currently, I do this work at Massachusetts General Hospital / Harvard Medical School. I look forward to doing this work as an Assistant Professor of School Psychology at the University of South Carolina, starting Fall 2026!
Please check out my work and feel free to reach out if you have any questions!
Research Interests
My research focuses on adolescent social development and well-being: assessing the positive influence of supportive relationships, leveraging near-peer supports to disseminate scalable programming, and integrating mental health supports into existing school and social systems to promote equitable mental health care.
Featured Publications
Costello, M.A., Nagel, A.G., Hunt, G.L., Rivens, A.J., Hazelwood, O.A., Pettit, C., & Allen, J.P. (2022) Facilitating Connection to Enhance College Student Well-Being: Evaluation of an Experiential Group Intervention. American Journal of Community Psychology, 70, 314-326. doi: 10.1002/ajcp.12601
Costello, M.A., Pettit, C., Hellwig, A.F., Hunt, G.L., Bailey, N.A., & Allen, J.P. (2024). Adolescent Social Learning Within Supportive Friendships: Self-Disclosure and Relationship Quality from Adolescence to Adulthood. Journal of Research on Adolescence. doi: 10.1111/jora.12947
Costello, M.A., Pascale, M., Potter, K., Knoll, S.J., Bodolay, A., Kaur, J., Du, R., Greenspan, L., Gray, C.A., McIntyre, J., & Schuster, R.M. (2025). Understanding Adolescent Mental Health Symptom Progression in School-Based Settings: The Substance Use and Risk Factors (SURF) Survey. School Psychology. doi: 10.1037/spq0000681