By Layla Martin, Research Story, Honorable Mention, UROC 2026.
My life has never followed a straight path, but I’ve always been inquisitive, with a drive to learn. Grade school was filled with academic pentathlons, science fairs, and even a scholarship to Space Camp. My trajectory seemed certain—as certain as one can be at that age—but life happened, and I found myself on a different path. I left high school early, took my proficiency exam, and moved out on my own at seventeen. I focused on making a living, working in restaurants, the movie industry, retail, interior design, and running my own jewelry business. Then everything changed. Again.
I was living in California when the pandemic hit, and something told me to move to New Mexico. I had lived here before and settled in easily, until an unexpected health crisis. I spent the next four months in and out of the hospital, forcing me to reevaluate everything. My instinct was to do all the things I’d been putting off. First on the list, travel. I traveled for months, or as my therapist likes to say, I ran. Whatever it was, my whole perspective on wants and needs changed. I changed.
Upon returning, I knew I could no longer stay on the path I was on before I got sick, and some part of me kept thinking about going back to school. As a first-generation student, I did not have a roadmap, but I was determined to find my way. I started taking online classes at CNM and I rediscovered the joy of learning. There was a lot of experimenting along the way, but before I knew it, I graduated with honors in Psychology and transferred to UNM. Even writing those words, I still can’t believe I’m here.
I knew I wanted to stay in psychology, and after losing both my grandmother and father to early-onset Alzheimer’s, I wanted to study the brain, which would eventually require going to graduate school. I had no idea how that process even worked. Then I discovered and applied to the McNair Scholars Program. Being accepted into the 2025-2026 cohort opened a whole new world for me.
` When it came time to find a mentor, I first thought I would join a lab focused on cognitive decline. I had just finished a research paper on posttraumatic stress disorder, and that subject kept pulling at me because it felt personally relatable. I also knew I wanted my work, as a Hispanic woman, to center on people with similar backgrounds. So, when I came across Dr. Cecilia Hinojosa’s lab and her work it was like I was on the right path again. I reached out and am grateful every day that she agreed to be my mentor and take me on as a research assistant.
My first semester in the lab was spent getting my footing. I had zero experience working in a lab and a serious case of imposter syndrome. Thankfully, Dr. Hinojosa, our lab manager Grace and graduate student, Sophia, along with my lab mates helped me adjust. The lab was also in the early stages of our studies, so it has felt like a gentle introduction, and a chance to learn from the ground up. I was still deciding between a clinical path and a research path, and I knew I couldn’t force an answer.
As my second semester in the lab began, so did the thoughts about what my McNair project would look like. I kept coming back to themes that shaped my life: trauma, advocacy, and culture. I began to explore the effects of colonization, PTSD, alcohol use, sexual assault, and historical trauma as a factor within Indigenous and Hispanic/Mexican American populations. This all meshed well with the lab’s current OASIS Study (Observing Alcohol use after Sexual trauma and its Impact on Students).
I came across the Historical Loss Scale and the Historical Intergenerational Trauma Transmission questionnaire as possible measures of historical trauma. Dr. Hinojosa asked me to compare them and recommend the best fit for our study. I found that the Historical Loss Scale made the most sense because it was designed with and for Indigenous populations, and a study from UNM had already modified it to better fit the population and our project. Dr. Hinojosa agreed, and I was off to begin my research.
The subject matter is heavy, but Indigenous Peoples remain underrepresented in psychological and neuroscience research. I will be conducting a subgroup analysis of female cisgender college students to ask: How does perceived historical trauma relate to PTSD symptom severity and alcohol-related behaviors in Latina and Native American college females with histories of sexual trauma? To investigate this, I will use the modified Historical Loss Scale, a 14-item measure that assesses historical loss related to historical trauma and how often these losses come to mind. Historical trauma is an invisible wound, persisting across generations through loss of culture, land, and language. Today it can appear as PTSD and alcohol use as a coping behavior.
While the OASIS study is getting underway, I expect females who report higher perceived historical loss will also have greater PTSD symptom severity and alcohol use, above and beyond discrimination, total trauma exposure, and coping styles. If perceived historical loss proves significant within this subgroup, future work could test longitudinal models, add qualitative interviews, and use neuroimaging. I hope this study contributes to the growing research on historical trauma and culturally grounded prevention and intervention efforts.
A few recent experiences have solidified this path in a way I did not see coming. Accompanying Dr. Hinojosa to our first participant’s fMRI scan put any doubt to rest about whether research is the direction I want to go. When I stood in front of my lab, full of nerves, to rehearse my UROC poster presentation, I felt an overwhelming sense of knowing I had yet to feel in academia. I had convinced myself that I would need to leave New Mexico to pursue my PhD, but in these moments, all the forks in the road finally met, and I now know I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.
If I could give advice to other students, it would be this: If I could give advice to other undergraduate researchers, it would be this: do not wait until you have it all figured out, just start. Keep going even when the path disappears for a while. There is no single right way to get here. Some of us take the long way, and that is okay. The important thing is that you find your way.