My scholarship seeks to answer this central question: How do we become moral beings in specific socio-cultural contexts? I adopt an interdisciplinary approach to examine this question, by putting anthropological and cognitive science theories in conversation, by combining ethnography and quantitative methods, and by drawing from the broad field of Chinese studies. Specifically, my research pursues three inter-related themes: 1) moral development in familial and educational settings in contemporary China; 2) Continuity and change in thoughts of morality and education in Chinese communities across time and space; and 3) cross-cultural comparison of socio-moral cognition between Chinese and Western populations.

I have published a monograph, The Good Child: Moral Development in a Chinese Preschool (Stanford University Press, 2017), telling the story of how China's "little emperors"––young children growing up under the one-child policy––learn morality amidst a perceived "moral crisis" in contemporary Chinese society. I have also published peer-reviewed articles in both anthropology and psychology journals. My article, “Becoming a Moral Child amidst China’s Moral Crisis: Preschool Discourse and Practices of Sharing” has won the 2013 Condon Prize of SPA (Society for Psychological Anthropology).

Currently I am working on two new projects: One project delves into heated debates in contemporary Chinese life and examines childrearing anxiety, social comparison, early education (ages 0-6) and children's wellbeing among urban middle class families in China. The other project connects to the history of sinological anthropology and the anthropology of childhood: To analyze and write up Dr. Arthur P. Wolf's unpublished dissertation fieldwork materials, materials collected in a Taiwan village (1958-1960) as an attempt to replicate and expand from the Six Cultures Study.

I received my BA and MA degrees from Tsinghua University, China, and my Ph.D. in Anthropology from Washington University in St. Louis. I then completed postdoctoral research in developmental psychology at the University of Washington.