My program of research seeks to improve health by increasing access to healthcare, particularly mental health care. This kind of research is often called “help-seeking,” “health services,” or “health care seeking/utilization” research. Increasing access requires identifying the most important psychosocial (e.g., stigma, attitudes), material (e.g., insurance, transportation), and contextual (e.g., racism, cultural norms) factors that help or stop people from seeking help, and then designing and testing interventions designed to address these factors.
My primary focus is using social science to create and refine theoretical models, measures, and methods that other scholarly and applied professionals can use to conduct better help-seeking research with the populations they seek to serve. These resources are provided free of charge at helpseekingresearch.com
I am available to serve as a co-investigator and consultant on funded projects that have a help-seeking component. I work on interdisciplinary teams to help close the mental health treatment gap for underserved populations. For example, I have a longstanding NSF-funded collaboration with Dr. Sarah Wilson (UK Chemical Engineering) focused on addressing the mental health needs of engineering students. I also enjoy working with undergraduate and graduate student members of the HAMMER (“Help-seeking And Multicultural Measurement Evaluation Research”) Lab team to publish help-seeking scholarship.
Here’s an informal 40-minute presentation, recorded during a HAMMER Lab meeting, where we talk about help seeking research broadly as well as the specific research interests (women, couples) that some of our lab members have: