Scholarship & Teaching
Psychological life within and against systems of racial power
Assistant Professor of Psychology, Pace University
My interdisciplinary scholarship examines how racialization and systems of power shape psychological life—self-understanding, fear and desire, distress and well-being, and possibilities for collective resistance. Much of this work centers Asian American lives at the intersections of gender, sexuality, and capital.
Bringing queer of color critique and psychoanalytic thought into conversation with empirical psychology, I use quantitative and qualitative methods informed by critical and interpretive frameworks. My projects address both measurable patterns of racism-related harm and the less visible ways ideology, history, and fantasy organize inner and collective experience. I examine not only intersecting forms of stigma and oppression but also the conditions that foster agency, flourishing, and more liberatory ways of understanding ourselves and relating to others.
Areas of Inquiry
1. Asian racialization & internalized oppression
How are racial meanings absorbed, negotiated, reproduced, and resisted in psychological life?
What do the distinctive functions and psychological consequences of Asian racialization reveal about the operation of whiteness, heteropatriarchy, settler colonialism, and racial capitalism?
2. Masculinities, sexualities, & intersectional experience
How do race, gender, sexuality, class, and other social locations shape one another in the lives of Asian Americans, particularly men?
What do the fears, desires, and conflicts that emerge at these intersections reveal about ideological and material structures of domination within and beyond the United States?
3. Affirmative intervention, resistance, & flourishing
What forms of affirmative interventions help people resist oppressive messages and build more integrated, flourishing lives?
How can psychological scholarship and practice move beyond documenting harm to cultivate agency and collective change?
Selected Publications
Choi, A. Y. (in press). Model minority myth: Rethinking the concept. In N. Tewari, A. N. Alvarez, & M. Fu (Eds.), Asian American psychology: Expanding identities (2nd ed.). Routledge.
Critically reassesses the model minority myth not merely as a stereotype but as an ideological and material structure of racialization that exploits Asian Americans to consolidate white supremacy, neoliberal multiculturalism, and settler colonial capitalism.
Choi, A. Y., Israel, T., & Nylund-Gibson, K. (2020). Syndemic behavioral risk and suicidality among bisexual adolescents: A latent class analysis. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 88(7), 597–612. https://doi.org/10.1037/ccp0000500
Introduces a novel approach to modeling syndemic conditions among bisexual adolescents, identifying distinct patterns of co-occurring risk and their differing associations with suicidality.
Choi, A. Y., Israel, T., & Maeda, H. (2017). Development and evaluation of the Internalized Racism in Asian Americans Scale (IRAAS). Journal of Counseling Psychology, 64(1), 52–64. https://doi.org/10.1037/cou0000183
Develops and validates a multidimensional measure of internalized racism among Asian Americans, encompassing negative self-evaluation, stereotypes of weakness, appearance-related bias, and associated mental health consequences.
Keum, B. T., Choi, A. Y., Verdugo, J. L., Xie, L., Zhu, C., & Oh, S. (2025). Flourishing and positive mental health among Asian American men: Development and validation of the Affirmative Socialization for Asian American Men Measure. Journal of Prevention and Health Promotion, 6(4), 667–707. https://doi.org/10.1177/26320770251351957
Establishes a multidimensional measure of affirmative gendered racial socialization practices that counter intersectional racism and relates to psychological flourishing among Asian American men.
Keum, B. T., Ahn, L. H., Choi, A. Y., Choudhry, A., Nguyen, M., Meizys, G. M., Chu, A., & Hearns, M. (2023). Asian American men’s gendered racial socialization and fragmented masculinity: Interpretive phenomenological analysis. The Counseling Psychologist, 51(5), 684–718. https://doi.org/10.1177/00110000231170310
Shows how distinctive and cumulative forms of gendered racism across the lifespan can fracture Asian American men’s masculine identities, undermine mental health, and underscore the need for affirmative socialization and structural change addressing whiteness and heteropatriarchy.
Fritz and Linn Kuder Early Career Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions
Society of Counseling Psychology, APA Division 17 · 2026
Edwin B. Newman Graduate Research Award
American Psychological Association and Psi Chi · 2020
Dr. Arthur M. Nezu Diversity Dissertation Award
American Board of Professional Psychology · 2020
Barbara Smith and Jewell E. Horvat Graduate Student Award for Research with LGBTQ Individuals of Color
Society for the Psychological Study of Culture, Ethnicity, and Race, APA Division 45 · 2019
Selected Research Honors
Teaching Philosophy
I believe people learn from how they are treated. My teaching is therefore grounded in respectful, intellectually serious relationships and a practice of pedagogical humility—honoring students’ agency, examining my own assumptions, and continuing to learn alongside them.
I aim to cultivate communities where psychological knowledge can be examined rigorously and questions that matter in students’ lives can shape the work. Rather than treating individual perspective merely as bias to be eliminated, I help students locate their standpoints within the historical and structural conditions shaping what they notice and take for granted.
Lived experience can then become both a source of insight and a site of disciplined inquiry. In conversation with scholarship and perspectives beyond one’s own, it can reveal how material conditions and ideological frameworks sustain arrangements that come to appear natural, inevitable, or beyond challenge.
For me, education becomes transformative when deeper insight strengthens a person’s intention and capacity to act. I invite students to consider how everyday interpretations and choices may reproduce injustice or create openings for greater personal and collective freedom. This requires clear expectations, sufficient trust for challenging discussion, and guidance that connects ideas with their practical and ethical implications.
Mentorship matters especially for those with limited access to the often-unspoken conventions of academic and professional life. I approach teaching as an ethical and collaborative endeavor that cultivates independent thought, a more critical and compassionate sense of one’s place in the world, and confidence in the possibility of meaningful action.
Selected Courses
My courses span the historical and theoretical foundations of psychology, ethical and sociocultural analysis, health equity, clinical knowledge and skills, and professional identity development. Across them, I help students connect theory and research with lived experience, critique the institutional arrangements and cultural politics that shape mental health and systems of care, and consider how these forces influence professional practice and its capacity to serve the people and communities it is meant to help.
History and Systems of Psychology
Public Health Psychology
Asian American Psychology
Ethics in Professional Psychology
Theories of Counseling and Psychotherapy
Helping Skills: Theory, Research, and Practice
Collaborations
I welcome substantive collaboration across academic, clinical, and community settings on questions of how social power enters inner life. I am especially interested in intersectional work on masculinity, sexuality, and desire among Asian American men and queer people of color. I am most drawn to projects that bring critical theory into meaningful dialogue with empirical inquiry, applied practice, or public engagement.
If you believe there may be a meaningful fit, please email me at achoi@pace.edu with a concise description of the project, its current stage and timeline, the people involved, and the role you are proposing. I prioritize work with a clear intellectual purpose, reciprocal contribution, and appropriate credit and support for everyone involved.
Given my limited capacity, I generally consider only inquiries with a defined purpose and role; I cannot offer informal mentorship or develop projects through initial outreach.
Prospective psychotherapy clients should use the secure initial evaluation request form.