Sruti Mohankumar is a recent graduate from Texas A&M University, where she earned her BS in psychological and brain sciences with certificates in behavioral health and the psychology of diversity. Throughout her undergraduate years, Sruti was involved in numerous research endeavors that centered on understanding how marginalized communities navigated barriers in education, employment, and access to care.
As a student in Texas A&M University’s Health, Empowerment, & Advocacy Lab (HEAL) led by Dr. Nguyen Nguyen, Sruti coauthored a paper (currently under review) exploring how the role of accents, which are often denoted as a key social marker, influence individuals’ perceptions of their own academic and professional capabilities, especially in a world where English is quickly becoming the dominant language in cross-cultural communication.
Sruti is set to begin her PhD in counseling psychology from Texas Tech University, where she intends to continue examining the intersection of linguistic marginalization and vocational psychology. As a future clinician, she hopes to work closely with South Asian communities, and believes that an immersive experience in India will deepen her understanding of culturally grounded perspectives on mental healthcare and help-seeking.
In her Fulbright-Nehru research project, Sruti is extending her previous research and employing a qualitative interview method to explore the nuanced responses to how regional dialects and accents within India influence both self-perception and social judgment. Given India’s vast linguistic diversity, she is particularly interested in how intranational variation in dialects and accents, which is often overlooked in discussions on language bias, affects educational and vocational outcomes.