Skip to main content
Apply Visit Give
Headshot image

Jean-Philippe Gouin, PhD

Thesis supervisor Accepting inquiries

  • Professor, Psychology

Research areas: Stress, depression, insomnia, social support, dyadic coping, health behaviour change, autonomic functioning, psychoneuroendocrinology, psychoneuroimmunology

Contact information

Email:

JP.Gouin@concordia.ca

Websites:

SIRH LAB
CCRH Website
Google Scholar Profile

Biography

Education

PhD - The Ohio State University
Clinical Residency - Rush University Medical Centre
MPs - Université de Montréal
BA - Université Laval

Biography

Dr. Gouin is a clinical and health psychologist. He is a former Canada Research Chair in Chronic Stress and Health and the director of the Stress, Interpersonal Relationships, and Health Laboratory.

Research interests

Our research program investigates the impact of psychological stress and social relationships on well-being and health outcomes across the lifespan. We are interested in identifying specific biopsychosocial pathways through which stress and social relationships influence risk for age-related diseases. Using a developmental perspective, we examine how early life stress and chronic stress exposure confer increased risk for age-related diseases later in life.

Specifically, we examine how stress and social relationships influence 1) positive and negative emotions, emotion regulation processes, and depression; 2) engagement in health behaviours, including sleep, physical activity, and diet; 3) stress-related physiological processes, such as chronic inflammation, metabolic dysfunction, and low parasympathetic functioning, and 4) the interactions among these different processes, in particular the bidirectional and reciprocal associations between psychosocial stress and inflammation. 

We are particularly interested in how spouses influence each other in terms of emotional responses, health behaviours, and physiology. Recent work aims at developing couples-based interventions to improve dyadic coping, how spouses work together to deal with the stresses that both partners are facing, and foster positive health behaviour change, including changes in diet, physical activity, and sleep-related habits. Our intervention development work also examines how to combine cognitive behavioural therapy and exercise training. In this context, we have completed studies examining the effects of cognitive-behavioural therapy and exercise training in the treatment of insomnia, obstructive sleep apnea, and their comorbidity.

Our work is funded by the Canadian Institutes for Health Research, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, the Réseau québécois de recherche sur le vieillissement, the Quebec Network for Suicide, Mood Disorders and Related Disorders, and the Canadian Lung Association.

Current studies examine:

-The moderating role of dyadic coping in the association between spousal control behaviour and changes in diet and physical activity among cohabiting couples. Funded by SSHRC.

-The impact of a couples-based lifestyle intervention on physical activity and blood sugar regulation among older adults with type II diabetes. Funded by Diabetes Canada.  

-Sex differences in the association between psychological distress and the risk of cardiovascular diseases. Funded by CIHR.



Representative Publications

*denotes students under my supervision


Gouin, J.P. & *Dymarsky, M. (2024). Couples-based health behavior change interventions: a relationship science perspective on the unique opportunities and challenges to improve dyadic health. Comprehensive Psychoneuroendocrinology, 19,100250.

Lara, E., *Matovic, S., Vasiliadis, H. M., Grenier, S., Berbiche, D., de la Torre-Luque, A., & Gouin, J. P. (2023). Correlates and trajectories of loneliness among community-dwelling older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic: A Canadian longitudinal study. Archives of gerontology and geriatrics, 115,105133.


*MacNeil, S., Renaud, J., & Gouin, J. P. (2023). Respiratory sinus arrhythmia, negative social interactions, and fluctuations in unmet interpersonal needs: A daily diary study. Suicide & life-threatening behavior, 53(4),597–612.


*Ouellet-Courtois, C., Gravel, C.*, & Gouin, J.P. (2023). A longitudinal study of “we-talk” as a predictor of marital satisfaction. Personal Relationships. 30(1), 314-331.


*Caldwell, W., MacNeil, S., Wrosch, C., McGrath, J.J., Dang-Vu, T.T., Morin, A.J.S., Gouin,J.P. (2022). Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia Moderates the Interpersonal Consequences of Brooding Rumination. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships.


*Gouin, J.P., *Paquin, C., Wrosch, C., McGrath, J., Arbour, N., & Booij, L. (2020). Marital Quality and Inflammation: the Moderating Roleof Early Life Adversity. Health Psychology, 39(1), 58-67


*Caldwell, W., da Estrela, C., MacNeil, S., Gouin,J.-P. (2019). Association between romantic partners’ brooding rumination and negative marital exchanges is moderated by respiratory sinus arrhythmia: An actor-partner interdependence model. Journal of Family Psychology.


*Gouin, J.P., Zhou, Q.Q., Booij, L., Boivin M., Côté, S.M.,Hébert, M., I. Ouellet-Morin, M. Szyf, M., Tremblay, R.E., Turecki,G., and Vitaro, F. (2017). Associations among oxytocin receptor gene (OXTR) DNA methylation in adulthood, exposure to early life adversity, and childhood trajectories of anxiousness. Scientific Reports. 7 (1): 7446.


Gouin, J.P., *Scarcello, S., da Estrela, C. Paquin,C., & Barker, E.T. (2016). Dyadic Coping and Inflammation in the Contextof Chronic Stress. Health Psychology, 35(10), 1081-1084.


Gouin, J.P., *Zhou, B., & Fitzpatrick, S. (2015). Social Integration Prospectively Predicts Changes in Heart Rate Variability Among Individuals Undergoing Migration Stress. Annals of Behavioral Medicine. 49(2), 230-238.


Kiecolt-Glaser, J.K., Gouin, J.P., Glaser, R., Malarkey, W.B., Pang, N. (2011). Childhood Adversity Heightens the Impact of Later-Life Caregiving Stress on Telomere Length and Inflammation. Psychosomatic Medicine, 73(1), 16-22.


Gouin, J.P., Carter, C.S., Pournajafi-Nazarloo, H., Glaser, R., Malarkey, W.,Loving, T., Stowell, J., & Kiecolt-Glaser, J. (2010). Marital Behavior, Oxytocin, Vasopressin, and Wound Healing. Psychoneuroendocrinology.35(7):1082-1090

Took 43 milliseconds
 
Back to top

© Concordia University