Six faculty members have received a College of Behavioral and Community Sciences (CBCS) Internal Grant Award. These grants are awarded annually to support research that shows promise for externally sponsored research funding.
Laura Curran, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Mental Health Law and Policy, will address the need for the development of data surrounding interventions to support postpartum individuals who experience opioid use disorder during the first year of their infant鈥檚 life. The study will generate evidence for the feasibility and acceptability of technology-based interventions used in treatment programs that serve postpartum individuals, leading to future research that will design and test interventions to meet the specific needs of this unique population.
Chae Jaynes, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Criminology, was awarded funding for the Aiding in Reentry (AiR) employment-based prison reentry program designed by USF faculty and students. The program is delivered in three state prisons and supported by an undergraduate course in which USF students develop reentry plans and resumes for incarcerated individuals nearing release. The goals of the AiR program are to: improve reentry outcomes for incarcerated individuals who are nearing release into the community, provide high-impact and community-engaged educational opportunities for USF students, and conduct high-quality research on understanding decision-making and labor market perceptions among high-risk individuals and how those factors impact reentry outcomes.
Soonhyung Kwon, PhD, assistant professor in the School of Social Work, will examine the feasibility and preliminary efficacy of an eight-week mindfulness intervention delivered via a mobile application for older Korean immigrants. This research will assess rates of recruitment, refusal, retention, compliance and adherence, as well as evaluate its impact on positive psychological well-being and adverse mental health outcomes. Older Korean immigrants in the U.S. face severe mental health disparities, but only 5.7% seek professional help due to barriers such as cultural differences, language limitations, financial constraints, and perceived stigma.
Ji-Young Lee, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Mental Health Law and Policy, aims to adapt the LGBT Minority Stress Measure with Asian American sexual and gender minority (SGM) individuals. This initial theoretically guided qualitative validation will lay the groundwork for subsequent quantitative validation to rigorously test the revised measure, ultimately enhancing our ability to understand, quantify, and address the unique mental health needs of Asian American SGM. Current tools, including the LGBT Minority Stress Measure, are often developed with predominantly white western populations and may overlook critical, culturally specific factors that impact Asian American SGM.
Varsha Rallapalli, AuD, PhD, CCC-A, assistant professor in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, will conduct research to establish the importance of preserving spatial information for listeners with different cognitive abilities. Speech-in-noise listening is particularly challenging for listeners with hearing loss and poor cognitive abilities, such as working memory. Current hearing aid treatments including directional microphones often fail to address this issue because they distort important spatial information crucial for understanding speech in real-world environments. This award will help fund the collection of preliminary data from twenty-two individuals with hearing loss with a long-term goal to develop a comprehensive model linking hearing aid processing with individual cognitive and peripheral abilities in real-world environments.
Joseph Walton, PhD, professor in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, will continue an investigation of ergothioneine (EGT), a compound that simultaneously treats multiple cellular systems implicated in age-related hearing loss. EGT is a dietary amino acid, described as a 鈥渓ongevity鈥� vitamin, with antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and other anti-aging properties. In previous studies, researchers found hearing protective effects in aged mice treated with EGT using systemic injections or gavage administration. Walton will now extend the pre-clinical study by adding EGT to aged animals鈥� drinking water to more closely correspond to a human therapeutic trial.
CBCS provided between $5,000 and $20,000 in funding for each project, with the amount of the award determined based on justification, other sources of funding, and the availability of college funds.