Ahva Mozafari is a doctoral candidate in the Clinical Psychology program at Idaho State University. She received her BSc in Psychology from Boise State University and her MSc in Clinical Psychology from Eastern Washington University. Her research interests include romantic relationships, shame, attachment, and culture. A large portion of her clinical work has been in community mental health with refugees as well as with US-born adults, children, and adolescents. She has also worked with couples and families. Mozafari was born and grew up in Boise, Idaho. Her parents are immigrants from Iran, and she has spent several summers there throughout her life. She identifies as a first generation Iranian American.

Xiaomeng (Mona) Xu is an Associate Professor of Experimental Psychology at Idaho State University. She received her BA in Psychology from New York University and her MA in Psychology and PhD in Social Health Psychology from Stony Brook University, and she completed a postdoctoral Research Fellowship sponsored by the National Institutes of Health at the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University and the Miriam Hospital.  Xu and her lab conduct both basic and applied research on romantic relationships, behavioral health, neuroimaging, and pedagogy. She was born in Fuling, a district of Chongqing Municipality in China and grew up in the United States. She conducted collaborative research in Bejing. She identifies as an immigrant.