Category: News

 

A research team from the University of Georgia will join 103 institutions from across the country to form a collaborative learning community that seeks to foster inclusive undergraduate science education.

Funded by a six-year, $493,065 grant from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Inclusive Excellence 3 (IE3) initiative, the UGA team will focus on three areas of effective and inclusive teaching including changes in policy, effective instructor development and optimal sources of evidence.

The HHMI’s IE3 initiative challenges U.S. colleges and universities to substantially and sustainably build capacity for students to have meaningful and positive experience in science through which they will better understand and engage in scientific thinking and discovery, especially students from backgrounds that have been historically excluded from the sciences.

Of the nearly one million students who enter college intending to study STEM, more than half will not complete a degree in a STEM field. Those who leave STEM are disproportionately students who are first in their family to attend college, students who begin at community colleges and students from historically excluded ethnic and racial groups.

The 104 participating institutions have been divided into seven Learning Community Clusters, or LCCs, that comprise approximately 15 schools each. These clusters will focus on the content of the introductory science experience, evaluating effective and inclusive teaching, and building partnerships between the two- and four-year schools.

Leveraging their collective experiences and resources, the UGA LCC4 research team aims to advance policies around inclusive and effective teaching for promotion and tenure, and to improve sources of evidence used to evaluate teaching more robustly and holistically.

“I think that one of the things we know from lots of research on teaching is that it’s not just about instructor knowledge and skills,” said program director Erin Dolan, who serves as Georgia Athletic Association Professor of Innovative Science Education in the Franklin College of Arts & Sciences Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. “It’s also about incentives, rewards and friction in the environment. What incentivizes an instructor to change their teaching if they need to? How do they know they need to change their teaching? What evidence can inform how they teach, including any changes they make? And then what makes it possible for changes to be sustained over time?”

According to Dolan, one of the things that the university’s recent NSF-funded, $2 million Department and Leadership Teams for Action (DeLTA) project did, which this project capitalizes on, is move away from assuming that faculty are going to be effective teachers from the first time they teach, and toward this idea of continuous improvement.

“And that’s really what we want,” Dolan said, “for people to be reflective teachers who base their teaching decisions on evidence.”

This new project is inherently a team effort. The core team is made up of two groups of faculty and administrators: an implementation team and an advisory team. Along with Dolan, the implementation team members include Tessa Andrews, associate professor in the Department of Genetics; Peggy Brickman, Meigs Professor in the Department of Plant Biology; and Paula Lemons, professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and associate dean of Franklin College. The advisory team will function more strategically and includes: Allan Aycock, director of assessment and accreditation, Office of Academic Planning; Michelle Cook, senior vice provost, Office of Institutional Diversity; Meg Mittelstadt and Ruth Poproski, director and associate director, respectively, of the Center for Teaching and Learning, Naomi Norman, associate vice president for Instruction, and Henry Young, Kroger Professor and head of the College of Pharmacy Department of Clinical and Administrative Pharmacy.

“This project definitely builds on the work that got started with the DeLTA project,” Dolain said. “It nicely complements work that’s happening in CTL with the new QEP and with the 2025 plan for promoting diversity and inclusion, along with the University Strategic Plan. It’s really well aligned with where the university is going, and I think that we are poised to make substantial improvements in supporting faculty in teaching more effectively and inclusively.”

More info.: Erin Dolan
Written by: Andrea Horsman

Dr. Lawrence Sweet was awarded the inaugural Lillian Eby OIBR Mentoring Award at our recent annual meeting.

Sweet, an OIBR Distinguished Scholar and Gary R. Sperduto Professor in Clinical Psychology in Franklin College, joined the University of Georgia faculty in 2012. He received a K award with mentee, Jiaying Lui, OIBR Distinguished Scholar and associate professor of Communication Studies and he also received a K award with mentee Assaf Oshri, OIBR Distinguished Scholar and associate professor of Human Development and Family Science. Prior to coming to UGA, Sweet was the mentor on five other grant awards.

His research interests include substance abuse and treatment outcomes (tobacco, vaping, alcohol, opiates), cardiovascular disease, aging, and outcomes of chronic stress and adversity. In collaboration with Dr. Liu, they recently received a R21 grant entitled, “A neuroimaging approach to advance mechanistic understanding of tobacco use escalation risk among young adult African American vapers.”

Dr. Sweet has received several other mentoring awards including the Richard L. Marsh Mentoring Award (UGA Psychology) and is a two-time recipient of the Psychiatry Research Mentor Award in the Alpert Medical School of Brown University.

“Mentoring is my favorite part of my job. Recognition from the outstanding faculty and staff at OIBR is a true honor. Their outstanding facilitation of research and mentorship is highly respected, and this association with Lillian Eby’s record of mentorship and service is such a compliment,” said Sweet.

 

Congratulations to our 2022 Rising Star, Justin Lavner!

The OIBR Rising Star Award recognizes the scholarly achievements and future potential of an OIBR Distinguished Scholar or Affiliate who is within 8 years of their Ph.D. This award focuses on exceptional and sustained research contribution and future promise, as evidenced by publications, grant submissions (both through OIBR and through other units on campus), funded grants, major works-in-progress and other discipline-relevant evidence of past and likely future scholarly impact.

Dr. Lavner received a beautiful commemorative plaque and a $1,000 research fund.

OIBR Affiliate Rebecca Nesbit, PhD was recently awarded a grant from AmeriCorps for her research project entitled, “Examining the Influence of Civic Infrastructure on Rural/Urban Volunteering and Civic Engagement.”

Community leaders depend upon civic engagement to address local issues, yet local capacity for civic engagement differs significantly across place. At the same time, ongoing shifts in the socio-demographic characteristics of communities and the drivers of civic engagement may be changing how Americans engage in their communities, particularly in rural communities where these shifts are creating greater barriers to participation.

“Unfortunately, we know little about the effect of the civic infrastructure on civic engagement,” said Nesbit, associate professor of nonprofit management in the department of Public Administration and Policy at the University of Georgia. “Furthermore, many contemporary studies of the place-based determinants of volunteerism and civic engagement are based upon data from metropolitan respondents, leaving significant gaps in our understanding of civic engagement in rural places.”

So, the question remains: How does a community’s institutional civic infrastructure (e.g. nonprofits, voluntary associations, philanthropic foundations) influence volunteering and other civic behaviors across rural and urban communities?

This research project explores the institutional, place-based determinants of differences in volunteering and civic engagement behaviors between rural and urban respondents using the confidential Current Population Survey (CPS) Volunteering Supplement, merged with county-level administrative records describing the local civic infrastructure (e.g. number of nonprofits, presence of community foundations).

Along with Co-PI, Dr. Laurie E. Paarlberg at the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy at IUPUI, the team will analyze this unique dataset in a secure Census Bureau Research Data Center (RDC) using multi-level modeling.

The goals of this research are to understand which community institutions (e.g. churches, schools, other nonprofits) have the biggest influence on volunteering in rural and urban places.  Dr. Nesbit wants to understand whether different community institutions have a different effect on volunteering for rural residents compared to urban residents. They hope make a significant contribution to the scholarship of volunteerism and civic engagement and professional discussions about building engaged communities by exploring the institutional community-level drivers and inhibitors of volunteering and civic engagement.

Dr. Nesbit had a prior AmeriCorps grant from 2017-2021 for a project titled “Examining the Community-Level Determinants of the Rural-Urban Volunteering Divide” which showed that community context matters for volunteering.  The current study expands on that research to look more specifically at the influence of community institutions on volunteering.

The total grant award amount is $191,670. for a period of one year and they already have forward funding for year 2. Dr. Nesbit expects to have three years of funding by the end of the project, assuming that the sponsor gets the funds they are planning on.

 

Written by: Andrea Horsman
For more info. contact: Rebecca Nesbit

 

The Association for Psychological Science has awarded the 2023 James McKeen Cattel Fellow award to OIBR Distinguished Scholar Dr. Gene Brody. This award recognizes APS members for a lifetime of outstanding contributions to the area of applied psychological research. Recipients must be APS members whose research addresses a critical problem in society at large.

Gene Brody is a Regents’ Professor in the Center for Family Research at the University of Georgia. His work has changed the landscape of developmental, health, and prevention science by demonstrating its potential for narrowing social and racial disparities in health and well-being. In addition, his prospective investigations of resilience among Black Americans have set a standard for conducting research with historically underrepresented populations that focuses on strengths rather than deficits and uses ecologically and culturally sensitive methods. Brody’s renowned work in the development of family-centered prevention programs has been shown to deter youth engagement in risky activities and promote mental and physical health. He has helped many youths in their journey through adolescence by identifying factors in support networks that buffer them from the consequences of chronic environmental stress. No less notable are his theoretical contributions to psychology, wherein he demonstrated how resilience is only “skin-deep” for some Black youth.

Check out this video to learn more about Dr. Brody’s research.

Written by: David Pollack

 

Georgia Clinical & Translational Science Alliance receives $73.7M to accelerate state’s medical research

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has awarded $58.6 million over the next five years to the Georgia Clinical & Translational Science Alliance (CTSA), a consortium of universities and healthcare providers that includes UGA, to continue its efforts to transform medical research into results that improve the health of people in Georgia and beyond. In addition to NIH funding, the Georgia CTSA will receive $15.1 million in support from its academic institutions.

“As in so many industries, Georgia is proud to lead the way in developing healthcare solutions that improve outcomes for all,” said Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp. “This funding award is just the latest recognition of the importance and cutting-edge position of the Georgia Clinical & Translational Science Alliance. I want to congratulate its members on this achievement and the positive impact it will have across our state and far beyond.”

Georgia CTSA accelerates clinical and translational education, research, workforce development, and community engagement. Its member institutions include UGA, Emory University, Morehouse School of Medicine and Georgia Tech.

“The Georgia CTSA has achieved so many great milestones in research, outreach, education and workforce development” said Brad Phillips, OIBR Distinguished Scholar, director of the UGA Biomedical and Translational Sciences Institute and the UGA principal investigator for the Georgia CTSA. “We have provided pilot research awards to over 10 faculty. We’ve also awarded mentored training grants to a diverse group of UGA predoctoral students and to junior faculty for careers in clinical and translation science. The majority of faculty who have finished the program have gone on to secure federal funding for their own research.”

Faculty, staff and students from across UGA contribute to the success of Georgia CTSA by leading its various initiatives. To highlight a few:

• The Mary Frances Early College of Education leads workforce development and has created an app, “eMPACT,” to help guide young faculty and students toward purposeful career advancement and training.
• The College of Family and Consumer Sciences leads community-engaged research through Georgia Extension, reaching all of the state’s 159 counties.
• The College of Pharmacy and School of Social Work collaborate with UGA’s Archway Partnership to address health disparities in Archway communities.
• UGA’s Clinical and Translational Research Unit provides hands-on training for students and the expertise and infrastructure for UGA faculty to conduct clinical trials in Athens as well as across the state through Georgia CTSA.
• As part of the CTSA One Health consortium, the College of Veterinary Medicine leads research, education and outreach on campus and across the country to optimize health of humans and animals.
• The College of Public Health leads on-campus Georgia CTSA support for faculty and students in biostatistics and research design.
• The Owens Institute for Behavioral Research leads engagement and recognition of UGA faculty in forming collaborative multidisciplinary research teams to address health priorities in the state.

As the only NIH-funded Clinical and Translational Science Award in the state, Georgia CTSA has served as a hub for innovation and scientific discovery across Georgia and the Southeast since its inception in 2007. This latest funding award will allow researchers to continue providing support and new tools in bioinformatics and biostatistics, piloting grants to fuel new research, and helping to train the next generation of clinical and translational science investigators.

To ensure Georgia CTSA’s emphasis on improving treatments reaches the communities and populations at highest risk for poor health outcomes, Georgia CTSA will establish its central theme aimed at addressing health disparities amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic. Health equity will be incorporated as a core component of all Georgia CTSA’s proposed work over the next five years.

 

“Our stated goal of enhancing health equity across the state of Georgia will require a sustained effort to address diversity and inclusivity in collaborating with impacted communities, and mentoring diverse early-stage investigators across the Georgia CTSA,” said Elizabeth Ofili, professor and principal investigator at Morehouse School of Medicine.

One example of how Georgia CTSA can leverage its resources to advance health equity is by creating opportunities to increase representation of ethnic or racial minority groups in clinical trials and other clinical studies. Its Integrating Special Populations program focuses on extending research testing and discovery to all populations in Georgia, with emphasis on rural health concerns. These types of measures can advance health equity, but more will need to be done to sustain progress.

“We are thrilled to continue our innovative and impactful partnership accelerating clinical and translational education, research and community engagement with a focus on enhancing health equity across Georgia and addressing the needs of the rural, poor and underserved populations statewide,” said Andrés García, Regents’ Professor and principal investigator at Georgia Tech.

Over the next five years, Georgia CTSA plans to build on the impact it has already made on statewide research efforts. Through the first four funding cycles, the alliance has awarded 472 pilot grants, contributed to more than 4,000 scientific publications, and assisted over 2,500 investigators.

Additionally, Georgia CTSA will address the critical need to train a new generation of clinical and translational science investigators. Trainees will be equipped to lead scientific teams that are urgently needed to generate new discoveries and translate those discoveries from the laboratory to the bedside and into the community to improve health for all, including underrepresented communities. These mentored research training activities are supported by the KL2 and TL1 research training components of the Georgia CTSA.

“The renewal of the Georgia CTSA provides critical support for our institutional alliance as we work together to tackle the major health issues facing the citizens of Georgia,” said Robert Taylor, professor and contact principal investigator at Emory. “We will continue our focus on reducing the tragic health disparities that exist across our state.”

Georgia CTSA is one of more than 60 CTSA program hubs at medical research institutions across the country supported by the NIH National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences.

 

Written by: Michael Terrazas

 

The University of Georgia has named nine faculty and academic leaders to the 2022-2023 class of the university’s Women’s Leadership Fellows Program.

“Through the Women’s Leadership Fellows program, the university is making a significant commitment to building leadership capacity across our campus,” said UGA President Jere W. Morehead. “We congratulate the members of this new class, who will gain skills and experiences that will benefit their careers and our institution.”

Two of the Women’s Leadership Fellows are also Distinguished Scholars at the Owens Institute for Behavioral Research.

Paula Lemons, professor of biochemistry and molecular biology and associate dean of social and behavioral sciences in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences. Her research focuses on how students develop conceptual understanding and problem-solving skills in college science courses and how to facilitate improvements in STEM education at the course, department and university levels. Lemons is a recipient of the National Science Foundation’s Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers. Her other honors include the University System of Georgia Board of Regents’ Excellence in Teaching Award.

Anne Shaffer, professor in the department of psychology in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences and associate dean of the UGA Graduate School. A clinical and developmental psychologist, her research focuses on risk, resilience and development in the family context, with an emphasis on emotion regulation and parent-child emotion communication. Shaffer’s honors include being named to the American Psychological Association’s 2021 Leadership Institute for Women in Psychology. In addition, she received the Award for Faculty Excellence in Diversity Leadership from the Franklin College.

UGA established the program in 2015 as part of its Women’s Leadership Initiative to provide a select group of current faculty and administrators with an opportunity to develop leadership skills while gaining a deeper understanding of the challenges and opportunities confronting higher education. The program specifically focuses on issues women face in academic administration.

“The talented faculty and administrators selected for the 2022-2023 class of the Women’s Leadership Fellows Program are leaders in their respective fields and on our campus,” said S. Jack Hu, the university’s senior vice president for academic affairs and provost. “They have made significant contributions to UGA, and their experiences in this valuable program will provide a foundation for them to make an even greater impact in the future.”

Throughout the yearlong program, the participants will attend monthly sessions to learn from senior administrators on campus as well as from visiting speakers from higher education, business and other fields.

How a company manages a new mother’s return to work could have a big impact on her emotional health.

Mental health problems such as postpartum depression or generalized anxiety disorder could affect up to one in five women during the postpartum period. According to recent University of Georgia research, the way a company treats a mother’s return to work can have major implications on her mental health.

The bulk of workplace variables that indicate positive outcomes for mental health is under the control of organizations. It can include having access to paid maternity leave, having a flexible schedule and a total workload.

However, according to lead author Rachel McCardel, a doctorate student in the College of Public Health at the University of Georgia, past studies that looked at how maternal mental health related to work had included returning to work with maternity leave.

“But return to work is more than that because, while maternity leave is an important resource, it doesn’t necessarily capture the actual process of when the leave ends and when you start resuming work, and when you start combining your roles as an employee and a mother,” she said.
Finding solutions may be made easier by comprehending the impact returning to work has on the mental health of working mothers. It will highlight potential areas for support or treatments to prevent or decrease the impact of disorders like depression or anxiety.

How Workplaces Influence the Mental health of Working Mothers

The authors conducted a systematic analysis of the peer-reviewed papers over the previous 20 years that investigated working mothers’ mental health in the United States. Cross-sectional and longitudinal studies on whether returning to work benefited or harmed mental health were included in the investigations.

“But when synthesizing all the studies together, we saw a type of conflict emerge between balancing responsibilities and demands associated with being an employee, as well as the responsibilities associated with being a parent, and wanting to meet the needs of both roles,” said McCardel.

They discovered that lower mental health outcomes were associated with increased conflict between the two roles.

Return to Work Programs

According to co-author and OIBR Affiliate, Heather Padilla, University of Georgia Assistant Professor of Health Promotion and Behavior at the College of Public Health, the term ‘return to work’ in workplace research refers to individuals who have been ill or injured and are returning to their jobs after a prolonged absence.

“There are return to work programs and, in some cases, a very systematic process to assess an employee’s capability and adjust their job responsibilities to help their transition back because the research shows that there are positive benefits to coming back to the workplace after an injury or an illness, but there’s a balance,” said Padilla. “I don’t know that we have those same conversations about the return to work after you’ve had a baby even though we treat pregnancy very much as a disability and illness in the U.S. workplace.”

The findings of this study suggest some methods that people might use to support their mental health as they resume their jobs. One resource mentioned as being crucial for parents returning to the workforce is coworker support. However, the decisions made by the organization will ultimately have the biggest impact.

According to McCardel, this review highlights the need to intentionally address mothers’ mental health in the workplace.

“It’s about creating that structure to say you are not alone. To show that as an organization, you care about your employees and value them. Let’s have a structure in place where we can have those conversations and meet those needs,” said McCardel.

 

Written by: Lauren Baggett

Correcting peers is key in small-group learning

Telling fellow students they are wrong can help everyone in the group learn

Collaborative group work is increasingly prioritized across higher education, particularly in the life sciences and STEM-related fields. But how students communicate within these smaller groups is key to their success.

New research from the University of Georgia suggests that students who understand what they do and do not know, and who are willing to ask for clarification and correct misinformation in the group, are more successful in small-group problem-solving.

The study, “Oh, that makes sense”: Social Metacognition in Small-Group Problem Solving, was published in the current issue of Life Science Education.

The new research advances the understanding of how students succeed in innovative instruction environments such as SCALE-UP classrooms and active learning courses.

“The move toward more collaborative learning is really big in life science education,” said Julie Dangremond Stanton, OIBR Distinguished Scholar and associate professor in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences department of cellular biology and corresponding author on the study. “If we’re going to ask students to work in small groups, then we have to provide them with some guidance on how to collaborate effectively while problem solving because they are still learning how to do this. Guidance on collaboration may be particularly important when we ask students to use scientific reasoning with their peers.”

Using discourse analysis to examine transcripts from two groups of three students during breakout sessions in an upper-division biology classroom, researchers identified statements and questions that work best in small-group settings. By analyzing the conversation for metacognition (the awareness and regulation of thought processes), the team – led by postdoctoral researcher Stephanie Halmo – identified seven types of metacognitive statements or questions.

By coding for reasoning, they uncovered four categories of metacognitive statements or questions associated with higher-quality reasoning. For example, when students identified a point of confusion and asked for clarification (e.g., “I don’t understand. Can you explain that?”) the group’s responses helped move their problem solving forward. As another example, when students asked questions that evaluated their group’s answers (e.g., “Does our answer address the question?”), the group’s responses helped them reason at a higher level.

Correcting a peer can be daunting, but it’s beneficial

“It’s fascinating to see. If you and I were working with one other person and you said something to me about how cell division works, and I thought I understood how that worked, but as you’re explaining it, I realize I don’t actually understand how cells divide,” Stanton said. “I might try to clarify my understanding by explaining it back, but maybe the third person we’re talking with realizes, oh no, Julie is still confused, let me correct this part and help her try to understand it.”

That ability, according to Stanton, can be important even though students may be otherwise socialized not to directly correct someone, because it could be considered confrontational. It’s a skill that also combines with an ability to listen and think about the discussion in the group.

“We created timelines of what students did during breakout sessions, and we see times when students are not speaking to each other, and I really appreciated this idea that maybe some silence can be very beneficial to group work, when you take a moment to think about what you’re going to say before you say it, or think about the problem before you jump in to solve it,” she said.

Periods of silence denoted better group problem solving

The researchers were initially excited by another group in the study who spoke continually, even finishing each other’s sentences. But the audio recordings and transcript revealed that, while the group had some success in problem solving, they would never directly correct each other. Even when one student said something that another knew was wrong, the second did not acknowledge the wrong answer by offering a correction or asking a question, and instead gently moved to something else.

According to Stanton the silence is an interesting indicator for both students and faculty, who may be more inclined to correlate noisy classroom discussions with better active learning as well as become concerned with periods of silence while students are working in groups.

Overlapping utterances that don’t include students being direct with one another can lead a group discussion in circles and may exhaust the participants. Instead, the new research suggests providing students more coaching around the metacognitive statements and questions that can promote problem solving. For instance, while it is normally not seen as socially acceptable to correct someone, not stopping to ask questions or make a point could lead down a road that’s not productive for the work or the learning situation as designed.

“We often think about metacognition as realizing what you do and don’t know,” Stanton said. “And a lot of times it’s really beneficial to work with other people because when you hear them talk – or when you explain something to them – you start to realize, OK wait I don’t actually know what I thought I knew.”

Writer: Alan Flurry, aflurry@uga.edu
For more information about this research, contact: Julie Dangremond Stanton, stantonj@uga.edu

 

There’s a slight gap in Dee Warmath’s academic resume.

A 19-year gap, in fact, between the time Warmath finished her master’s program and earned her doctorate.

“I thought I’d go out and see the world maybe for a couple of years and then I’ll come back and finish the Ph.D. and teach,” she said. “A couple of years turned into decades, and those years were wonderful.”

Warmath, an Affiliate with OIBR and an assistant professor in the College of Family and Consumer Sciences, received her master’s degree in sociology from Vanderbilt University in 1991. She then took a job building retail sales forecasting models for Service Merchandise.

That entry into the corporate world led to a variety of high-profile data analysis and market research positions with several companies, including J.C. Penney, Kohl’s and the NPD Group.

Warmath’s background in sociology and psychology gave her a unique insight into consumer behavior that proved valuable in her career in industry, she said.

“I traveled a ton, worked with some very interesting people, met with some really cool companies and people doing very innovative things who were just trying to figure out their business in a better way,” she said.

Despite the success she enjoyed in her career, Warmath also felt a tug back to academia.

“I knew if I didn’t go do what I always wanted to do, I would probably never have that chance,” she said.

While working at NPD, she went back to school, earning her Ph.D. in consumer behavior and family studies with a minor in marketing from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

“I finished my Ph.D. in three years while working 80 hours a week and taking about 120 airline flights a year,” she said. “I wrote my entire dissertation on airplanes. I still do my best work on airplanes—it’s the perfect environment to work in.”

Warmath came to UGA in 2018, where she teaches consumer analytics and social entrepreneurship for consumer well-being in the FACS department of financial planning, housing and consumer economics.

Her research focuses on how consumer decision-making, self-efficacy and motivation affect well-being.

“I was always asked why I didn’t go to a business school or marketing or something like that,” she said. “But my entire career was about making sure the consumer was represented in the meetings and discussions. I worked for years to try to find this mutually beneficial space, and that’s where I wanted my research to be.”

Warmath has a passion for the practical application of research. “I love research and doing things that have an impact and aren’t just purely theoretical,” she said. “Here, it all kind of fits together because it has this sense of promoting well-being at the center of it, trying to make people’s lives better. I love that.”

More information about Dr. Warmath and her research here.