Professor Donahoe is completing a doctorate in developmental psychology from the University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill. She previously was a visiting psychology professor at Whitworth College in Spokane, Washington, where she won the Outstanding Collaborative Teaching Award in 2006 for a study trip to the Gulf Coast to serve and study communities in crisis. With colleagues, she presented a poster at the Society for Research in Child Development. She also co-authored an article in Developmental Psychology about visuo-spatial short-term memory in a child’s first year.

Professor Donahoe is a member of the Society for Research in Child Development, the International Society on Infant Studies, and the Cognitive Development Society.