Lily Gorman is a first-year PhD student in the HDFS program. She specializes in Adulthood, Aging, and Gerontology and hopes to research familial caregiving and end-of-life decisions under advisor Dr. Laura Donorfio.
Although Lily grew up in Massachusetts, she was raised as a UConn fan since her parents and extended family are from Connecticut. She graduated from Salve Regina University in 2020 with a BA in Psychology and a minor in Neuroscience and Spanish. She had a range of undergraduate research interests including autism, death in the family, and the effects of a childhood belief in Santa Claus. Due to her personal experiences, she was inspired to shift her focus to elderly populations and spent over 3 years working at the Boston Center for Memory on 25+ Alzheimer's Disease clinical research trials.
Her current research interests include the dynamics between multiple caregivers in a family, ways to improve discussions about death and end-of-life choices, and how different personal factors influence caregiving experiences, such as gender, age, culture, etc.
Lily spends her free time reading, playing chess, and going to the beach whenever she can. She is a washed-up collegiate tennis player who now prefers to stay active via exercise classes and long walks.