Education
M.S. Marriage, Family, and Human Development, Brigham Young University, 2023
B.S. Family Life with an emphasis in Family Studies, Brigham Young University, 2021
Research interests
• The bidirectional associations between couples’ financial management behaviors and their romantic relationship functioning
• Couples’ communication about finances
• Individuals’ financial management behaviors, financial satisfaction, and financial stress
Clinical interests
• Couples’ financial management and communication difficulties
Publications/Posters/Papers
Saxey, M. T., Dew, J. P., Yorgason, J. B., & LeBaron-Black, A. B. (2023). Which came first, the money or the sex? Bidirectional, indirect associations between financial management behaviors and sexual satisfaction among newlywed couples. The Journal of Sex Research. Advance online publication.
https://doi.org/10.1080/00224499.2023.2206818
Saxey, M. T., LeBaron-Black, A. B., Dew, J. P., Yorgason, J. B., James, S. L., & Holmes, E. K. (2023). Money to marriage, or marriage to money? Examining the directionality between financial processes and marital processes among newlywed couples. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 40(8), 2445–2465.
https://doi.org/10.1177/02654075221149967
Dew, J. P.,
Saxey, M. T.., Mettmann, A. (2022). Money lies and extramarital ties: Predicting separate and joint occurrences of financial deception and extramarital infidelity. Frontiers in Psychology, 13, Article 1038169.
https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.1038169
Saxey, M. T., Li, X., Wikle, J. S., Hill, E. J., LeBaron-Black, A. B., James, S. L., Brown-Hamlett, J. L., Holmes, E. K., & Yorgason, J. B. (2022). Latent profiles of sleep quality, financial management behaviors, and sexual satisfaction in emerging adult newlywed couples and longitudinal connections with marital satisfaction. Frontiers in Psychology, 13, Article 883352.
https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.883352
Saxey, M. T., LeBaron-Black, A. B., & Curran, M. A. (2022). The sooner, the better? Couples’ first financial discussion, relationship quality, and financial conflict in emerging adulthood. Journal of Financial Therapy, 13(1), 1–19.
https://doi.org/10.4148/1944-9771.1299
Accomplishments
• Presidential Graduate Research Fellowship, 2023–2026
• Best Family Financial Well-Being Student Paper Award from the NCFR Family Financial Well-Being Focus Group (2023)
• "CREATE”-OR Award for Most Peer-Reviewed Publications using the CREATE Dataset (Family Finance Research Renaissance Retreat IV in June 2023)
Fun Facts
Favorite quotes/sayings?
“A transitional character is one who, in a single generation, changes the entire course of a lineage. . . . Their contribution to humanity is to filter the destructiveness out of their own lineage so that the generations downstream will have a supportive foundation upon which to build productive lives.” ~ Carlfred Broderick
Any lessons learned?
Life is too short not to laugh … and to enjoy pizza at least once a month.
Childhood jobs?
Baseball umpire
What advice would you offer to someone thinking about graduate school?
There are more ways to land your dream job than graduate school—don’t just go to graduate school just to go. If your dream job requires that you earn a graduate degree, then strongly consider finding the right graduate program where you can (1) become someone who could thrive in your dream job and (2) lessen or eliminate the chances of having any student debt.