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About the Health Disparities Research Interest Group

At the Health Disparities Research Interest Group (HDRIG), we conduct research on racial disparities in health in order to improve population health outcomes. Our team works on multiple interdisciplinary health studies that span the fields of nursing, social welfare, psychology, social demography and social policy and African Diaspora studies. In each project we examine the relationship between the social determinants of health and the health of individuals in order to translate research findings into meaningful community-based prevention strategies.

Current Projects

Title: Health Sciences Graduate Program Pipeline Project.

The purpose of this project is to develop a pipeline program to diversify the pool of undergraduate students pursuing a graduate degree in the Health Sciences. We will develop a 2 year pathway program that will increase student competitiveness for graduate school within HS fields starting with medicine, public health and social work, and expanding to other health sciences related fields. This collaborative project includes, students, staff, faculty and clinical professionals to identify the hidden knowledge and curriculum embedded in current pathways to graduate school. A list of 5 core competitive competencies will be identified to increase grad school competitiveness.

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Title: COVID-19 Vaccine Motivation and Hesitancy.

This series of studies examines the social determinants of health that lead to vaccine adherence or hesitancy among a sample of black respondents in the US and Canada. Our current findings suggests that there are dissimilar motivations for vaccine refusal and adherence across black ethnic subgroups and that public health professionals must identify which pathos of appeals are persuasive enough and specific to ethnic subgroups in order to communicate the importance of vaccine adherence.

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Title: Daily Hassles and Health Across African, African American and Afro-Caribbean Populations in the US and Canada.

In this study we examine the relationship between daily hassles, stress and health and how racial, ethnic, cultural and social identities may serve to protect health.  This cross-sectional study uses a self-administered online questionnaire to identify subgroup differences in appraisal of daily hassles as stressful among respondents including African American/Black Canadians, Afro-Caribbean, and African respondents.

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Past Projects

Title: Association between School and Workplace Racial Discrimination, Substance use and Negative Psychological Symptoms.

Results of our published findings reveal an association between racial bullying status (not involved, bullying victim, bullying perpetrator, or mixed bullying victim/perpetrator) and youth substance use. Racial bully perpetrators were most likely to have used cigarettes, alcohol and marijuana, followed by youth in the mixed victim/perpetrator group. Our investigation of work place racial discrimination (WRD) and psychological symptoms such as depression, emotional symptoms, and substance use in working adults (under review) revealed workplace racial discrimination did predict whether or not a respondent had experienced negative emotions due to treatment based on race for all race/ethnic groups, as did having received a diagnosis of depression. Those who had experienced WRD were more than 10 times more likely to have experienced negative emotions due to treatment based on race than individuals who had not experienced WRD. Individuals with a diagnosis of depression were two-to-four times more likely to have experienced negative emotions than those whom had not received a diagnosis of depression.

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