Opioid addiction treatment in teens focus of new project
Substance use disorders continue to rise at alarming rates among adolescents, with opioid abuse contributing to this significant public health problem. A Penn State researcher and his team will receive over $1.8 million over three years from the National Institute on Drug Abuse to investigate how…
Consortium to Combat Substance Abuse announces Community Fellows
Penn State’s Consortium to Combat Substance Abuse recently announced the first three recipients of its Community Fellows Program awards.
The program provides release time for faculty members to develop community collaborations and build sustainable, evidence-based or evidence-informed…
Strategies for Sexual Abuse Prevention: Raising Safe and Healthy Children
More than 20 percent of children who are sexually abused are assaulted before the age of eight, resulting in some of these children developing emotional and mental health problems, abusing alcohol and drugs, and dropping out of school. Early intervention and prevention efforts can decrease many of…
Scientists discover hundreds more genes with potential link to addictions
Many human diseases, such as tobacco and alcohol addictions, are heritable. Until now, little has been known about what genetic factors contribute to these addictions, and if they put people at risk of inheriting other medical conditions. A recent study, published in Nature Genetics, reveals that…
Wilkinson receives 2019 President’s Award for Engagement With Students
Krista Wilkinson, professor of communication sciences and disorders in the College of Health and Human Development and SSRI co-funded faculty member, has received Penn State's 2019 President’s Award for Engagement with Students.
The award is given to a faculty member who goes beyond his or her…
Opioid initiative earns 2019 Community Engagement and Scholarship Award
The Share Your Opioid Story Initiative, led by Glenn Sterner, assistant professor of criminal justice at Penn State Abington, has received the 2019 Penn State Award for Community Engagement and Scholarship.
The award recognizes a project that best exemplifies Penn State as an “engaged institution…
Building and Using Evidence to Improve Government Effectiveness
This chapter in the FY2020 President’s Budget discusses the importance of evidence in improving government effectiveness and strategies to learn and improve, including learning agendas, program evaluation, harnessing data, and promoting transparency and accountability.
Evaluating spousal caregivers stress
Spousal caregivers can face increased health risks, such as high blood pressure and heart disease, possibly due to the stress of caring for an ailing spouse.
To evaluate this stress in daily life situations, researchers Stephanie Wilson, postdoctoral fellow at Ohio State's Institute for Behavioral…
Scanlon Named AJAC Editor-In-Chief
The American Journal of Accountable Care® (AJAC) is pleased to announce that Dennis P. Scanlon, previously associate editor of the Journal, is editor-in-chief as of the March 2019 issue.
Scanlon is a distinguished professor of health policy and administration and director of the Center for Health…
NIH Releases Protocol Template for Behavioral and Social Sciences Research Involving Humans
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has launched a new protocol template to help behavioral and social science researchers prepare research protocols for human studies measuring social or behavioral outcomes.
The protocol template is an effective resource for communicating the science, methods…
Why Social Science? - Because Social Science Equips Us with Tools We Will Need to Face Down the Biggest Issues of Our Time, Including the Growing Global Threat of Climate Change
By The Honorable Paul Tonko, United States Representative, New York’s 20th Congressional District, U.S. House of Representatives
Our Earth is in crisis. More frequent and severe droughts, rising sea-levels, extreme weather and ecological damage are already here, with more loss and hardship on the…
Become a Certified Recovery Specialist
Do you have a history of addiction recovery and want to help others?
The Certified Recovery Specialist Program being offered through the Penn State Shenango and Beaver campuses is a 54-hour, peer support program designed to meet the current educational requirements for the CRS credentials set…
Employment Reductions and Government Revenue Losses from Opioid Misuse
By Amanda Honeycutt
The economic burden of the U.S. opioid epidemic likely exceeds $78.5 billion per year when considering its impact on healthcare, substance abuse treatment, the criminal justice system, and productivity costs. Although medication assisted treatment for opioid abuse (covered…
SSRI RV available to researchers
The SSRI RV is a resource available for researchers to facilitate future projects aimed at external funding. Currently, the RV is currently being used by Janet van Hell, professor of psychology and linguistics, in school locations to conduct neurocognitive research. In the past, the RV has…
Child Maltreatment Solutions Network seeking conference presentation proposals
The Penn State Child Maltreatment Solutions Network is seeking proposals for paper and poster presentations at its 2019 conference, which will be held Sept. 23-24 at the Nittany Lion Inn at University Park. The title of this year’s conference is “The Future of Foster Care: New Science on Old…
Penn State research team advances health equity in Pennsylvania
Penn State researchers recently contributed to the “The State of Health Equity in PA” report, compiled by the Pennsylvania Department of Health through the Office of Health Equity (OHE).
Max Crowley, director of the Evidence-to-Impact Collaborative and assistant professor in human development and…
Crowley and Scott to speak at American Youth Policy Forum
Penn State’s Max Crowley and Taylor Scott, along with Emily Douglas, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, will be presenting on the Research-to-Policy Collaboration Model at the American Youth Policy Forum taking place March 25, 10 – 11:30 a.m. in Washington D.C.
At the forum, “Evidence-Based Policy:…
Inaugural substance abuse conference to be held April 29 at University Park
Penn State’s Consortium to Combat Substance Abuse (CCSA) will host a conference to bring together researchers, practitioners, policymakers, foundation representatives, and the public to discuss significant and emerging problems in combating substance abuse.
“Envisioning a Future Free from Addiction…
Registration open for seminar on how views on time affect teams
“The Clocks That Time Us: Navigating Temporal Differences in Teams” will be presented at the next Penn State Clinical and Translational Science Institute Bench to Bedside and Beyond Seminar Series, from noon to 1 p.m. on Thursday, March 28.
In addition to being held in 116 Henderson…
A close watch: IST seed grant funds study to assess and predict substance co-use
A technology-based intervention that could reduce the risk of young adults simultaneously using alcohol and marijuana may soon be as close as a user’s wrist, thanks to a new study launched by researchers at Penn State.
The team recently earned a seed grant from the College of Information Sciences…
Families and schools may play key roles in promoting adolescent self-confidence
Self-confidence is critical for teens as they prepare for the challenges of adulthood, and both families and schools may together play a vital role in boosting adolescents’ confidence even in the face of difficulties with family, according to researchers.
The researchers examined how a variety of…
Penn State researchers contribute to special section on puberty research
Puberty is a distinct developmental period with unique research opportunities, according to a group of current and former Penn State researchers who collaborated on several papers that comprise a special section on puberty in the current Journal of Research on Adolescence (JRA).
“With fewer papers…
Penn State research highlighted in OSSBR Connector
Physiological indicators for personalized medicine: towards optimal behavioral interventions for at-risk children
Personalized healthcare has the potential to optimize the effectiveness of behavioral interventions. Recent research supported by NICHD, NIDA, and co-funded by OBSSR looked at how…
Eliminating smoking and obesity could affect racial health disparities
Obesity and smoking are the two leading causes of preventable deaths in the U.S., yet their full impact on health disparities is still being uncovered.
Michelle Frisco, associate professor of sociology and demography and Social Science Research Institute co-funded faculty member at Penn State, is…
Researchers recognized for innovative work in aging
The Mather LifeWays Institute on Aging has recently recognized three investigators in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at Penn State for their innovative research in aging.
Nilam Ram, professor of human development and family studies and psychology; Lizbeth Benson, a…