Sylvana Côté is a full professor for the Department of Preventative and Social Medicine of the Montreal's University Public Health School. She is the director of the GRIP. She is also the assistant chief of the "brain and child development" axis at the Research Centre of the CHU Ste-Justine.

The works of the professor are anchored in a intergenerational perspective that mainly touch on the fields of developmental psychopathology and the epidemiology of mental health throughout life.

She studies, with the help of longitudinal data (individuals followed from childhood to adulthood) and experimental data, questions such as : How individual's life trajectories vary by family and social conditions in which they grow up? What are the common denominators (environmental or biological) between individuals who struggle (mental health, studies) and those who succeed? And particularly,  in which measure can we modify the life trajectory of vulnerable children by supporting them via prevention programs or adapted services. She's particularly interested to the protective role of preschool education for children of underprivileged families.

Her studies are about the association between family risk and the development and the intergenerational transmission of physical and mental health problems by focusing on the life trajectory of the child. The research program of the professor Côté is centred around two main axis.

• The early determinants of psychosocial development in children and teenagers. This axis brings together studies aimed at demonstrating that many of the mental health problems that emerge during early childhood continue throughout life. In addition, they aim to achieve a better understanding of the role played by environmental and genetic factors that, from the first years of life, would affect the development and the stability of mental health problems in children and teenagers.
• The evaluation educational programs offered in daycare services. Sylvana Côté and her team set up randomized controlled trials to study the impact of intervention programs dedicated to children who attend childcare services located in underprivileged areas of Canada and France. The work of this axis aims to identify strategies to improve the quality of these services and to study the role of preschool education on cognitive development and health.