Dr. Melby is an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies. She has served as the Child Welfare Research and Training Project (CWRTP) Director since June 2011. In this role she provides overall leadership, management, planning, and direction for all CWRTP contracts. She works closely with project leads and faculty associated with these contracts.

Dr. Melby has extensive experience in conducting externally funded research. Since 1993 she has been a co-investigator, co-principal investigator or principal investigator on 14 federally-funded grants and subcontracts supported primarily by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). She has supervised the observational assessment components of 16 grants awarded to other principal investigators while serving as the Observation Unit Director at the Institute for Social and Behavioral Research (ISBR) and Survey and now at Survey and Behavioral Research Services (SBRS). Her prior experience and her current position as Director of CWRTP provide her with opportunities to work synergistically with a number of researchers at Iowa State University and at other research institutions.

In addition to Dr. Melby’s activities in supporting the research of other investigators, her own research program focuses on two primary areas: (1) factors associated with the development of competence and well-being in children, youth and families, and (2) development and evaluation of measures for assessing human behaviors and interaction processes, specifically observational assessments.