The Wayne State University Dual-Title Social Work and Infant Mental Health Doctoral Program invites you to join them for the Dissertation Defense of PhD Candidate Ajene M. Gailliard titled "Reexamining BIAS: Beliefs, Implicit Attitudes/Assumptions, Stigma/Stereotypes of Black Perinatal Women.” This dissertation explores how social stigma, mental health stigma, and gendered ethnoracial stereotypes shape Black women’s perinatal mental health experiences of Black women in the United States. Using Reflexive Thematic Analysis of in-depth interviews, this study identified Stereotype-Driven Perinatal Stigma (SDPS) as a distinct, chronic stressor characterized by emotional suppression, hypervigilance, anticipated judgment, and reluctance to seek mental health support amid unrecognized controlling images of Black womanhood and motherhood. Findings underscore that perinatal mental health inequities cannot be addressed without accounting for the cumulative psychological toll of stigma and stereotyping, highlighting the need for stigma-aware and anti-stereotype social work and Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health practice.