A researcher in the middle of becoming one.

Madison Kellier is a member of the Class of 2026 at Case Western Reserve University, completing a joint BA in Psychology and Pre-Architectural Studies. In Fall 2026 she will begin the Urban and Community Planning MS at Pratt Institute's School of Architecture.

Her undergraduate research takes shape across three overlapping threads. The first examines the psychological costs of the Strong Black Woman Schema — how endorsement of the Superwoman ideal relates to emotional suppression, chronic stress, and mental health outcomes for Black women. The second considers the underdiagnosis of autism in Black men and women, and what current diagnostic patterns reveal about who is recognised and who is missed. The third reads the historical constraints of jezebel and mammy stereotypes against contemporary patterns of appropriation by white women. Each is taken up at greater length on the Selected Work page.

The move to planning is not a departure from this work; it is a translation of it. The Pratt program is built around equity- building improvements to the built environment, environmental and social justice, and an intersectional approach to who cities are designed for. The psychological literature on stigma, access, and culturally responsive care answers questions about people; the planning literature on housing, neighbourhoods, and public space answers questions about the conditions those people live in. The connection between the two — what one field knows that the other should — is something Madison is at the start of articulating, not the end.

Her work on the Strong Black Woman Schema has been supervised by Yehudis Keller, mentor, Department of Psychological Sciences. For correspondence about collaboration, graduate inquiries, or reading suggestions, the contact page is the most reliable way to reach her.