Yixin obtained her BSc degree in Psychology and MEd degree in Developmental Psychology at Beijing Normal University.

She is a PhD student on a project that examines children’s emerging need for self-esteem. She is interested in children emerging self-views, especially in middle to late childhood, when children gradually form domain-specific evaluations of their competence. She is also interested in the way children pursue desirable self views. She studies the self-system through a cross- cultural lens.