Dr. Ricketts is an Assistant Clinical Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences. She is housed in the Child OCD, Anxiety, and Tic Disorders Program. Here, she provides training and supervision to clinical graduate externs; serves as an attending in the outpatient trainee clinic, where she trains and supervises clinical psychology interns and psychiatry fellows in behavior therapy; and treats patients with tic disorders, OCD, body-focused repetitive behavior disorders, and anxiety disorders.
Dr. Ricketts’ research centers on sleep and circadian disturbance and intervention in Tourette’s disorder, OC-related disorders (trichotillomania, skin picking disorder), and associated psychopathology (anxiety, ADHD). She has received grant funding from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), Tourette Association of America, Brain and Behavior Research Foundation, and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. Ongoing and recent grant-funded projects center on circadian rhythms (dim light melatonin onset) and sleep (actigraphy, home polysomnography), and novel wearable interventions (light therapy, frontal cerebral thermal therapy) in youth and adults with Tourette’s disorder. Dr. Ricketts maintains research collaborations with the UCLA Laboratory of Circadian and Sleep Medicine and UCLA Cannabis Research Initiative. Her emerging research interests span behavior therapy and light therapy for adolescents with delayed circadian timing in clinical populations, the impact of light exposure and light sensitivity on sleep and circadian disruption and related markers of health, and the therapeutic potential of cannabis for insomnia.