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Erika M Manczak

Erika M Manczak

Associate Professor

erika.manczak@du.edu

303-871-2576 (Office)

https://liberalarts.du.edu/psychology/biology-environments-mood

Personal

Frontier Hall, 2155 S. Race St. Denver, CO 80208

What I do

I am an Associate Professor in the clinical graduate area of the Department of Psychology studying the interplay between biological and environmental processes in the development of depression in children, adolescents, and parents.

Specialization(s)

Clinical psychology, immunology, climate change

Professional Biography

I joined the Department of Psychology in 2018 as an Assistant Professor and I am affiliated with the clinical child psychology Ph.D. program and the Stress, Early Experience, and Development (SEED) Research Center. I received my Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Northwestern University in Evanston, IL and completed a postdoctoral research fellowship at Stanford University.

Degree(s)

  • Ph.D., Clinical Psychology, Northwestern University, 2017
  • MS, Clinical Psychology, Northwestern University, 2013
  • BA, College Scholar Program: "Psychonarrative Application", Cornell University, 2007

Licensure / Accreditations

  • Licensed Psychologist

Research

My program of research examines the biological and psychological mechanisms through which experiences during childhood and adolescence confer risk for mental and physical health disorders. I am especially interested in how important social relationships affect immune processes that in turn increase risk for depression in adolescence; however, my work also examines risk across other developmental periods (e.g., adulthood, prenatal) and considers a variety of additional biological pathways (e.g., epigenetic modifications, somatic fitness). Current areas of interest include ways in which exposure to air pollution and other phenomena related to climate change increase risk for mental health symptoms in teenagers, connections between immune activation and depressive symptoms, and how different types of social relationships affect biological processes.

Areas of Research

Depression
child psychopathology
inflammation
family relationships
immune system
climate change
pollution

Key Projects

  • Air pollution exposure and emerging depression risk: Testing the role of peripheral inflammatory cytokines during adolescence
  • Exposure to extreme temperature and adolescent depression: Probing biological pathways and interactions with air pollution
  • Inflammatory trajectories across pregnancy
  • Molecular and Protein-Level Markers in a Social Immunological Model of Depressive Symptoms

Featured Publications

Manczak, E. M. (2026). Revisiting ’environmental effects’: Directions for multidisciplinary investigations of air quality and psychopathology. Clinical Psychological Science, 14(4).
Manczak, E. M. (2025). Between- and within-person associations between serum lipids and adolescent depressive symptoms. Developmental Psychobiology, 26(6).
Manczak, E. M. (2025). Air pollution’s hidden toll: links between ozone, particulate matter, and adolescent depression. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 21, 1663.
Manczak, E. M. (2023). Is there a cost to caring? Dispositional affective empathy interacts with depressive symptoms to predict higher levels of C-reactive protein 8 years later. Biological Psychology, 180, 108573.

Graduate Mentorship

​​​​​​Dr. Manczak will NOT be reviewing applications for fall 2026 admission.