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News Archive

Research

  • Jennifer Lewis and Anne Katz

    Two faculty members of the USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work have received the prestigious Fulbright Specialist Program award from the U.S. Department of State to further their research internationally.

  • CAPTA

    Over the last decade, as opioid abuse has become a national epidemic and the number of infants and young children removed from their families because parental substance use has risen, federal child-protection policies have struggled to keep pace. Currently, the foundational child-protection legislation in the United States, the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA), is up for reauthorization in the U.S. Senate and includes significant changes aimed at better addressing this crisis.

  • John Blosnich

    In the United States, a person dies by suicide every ten minutes. This is a public health epidemic that has consistently increased over the past 15 years and incurred more than $70 billion in medical costs and lost productivity. It has become all too common in the wake of an individual’s suicide to hear family, friends, colleagues - even the media - say, “If we had only known how bad things were.”

  • Alzheimer's Caregivers

    There’s an invisible, unpaid workforce caring for the 6 million Americans currently living with Alzheimer’s disease. The USC Schaeffer Center for Health Policy and Economics estimates that 11 million family caregivers bear this emotional, physical and financial burden, mostly on their own.

    USC experts say that while we wait for better Alzheimer’s treatments, there’s something we can do right now: Turn our attention to the caregivers.

  • Vaccine Hesitancy

    About 40% of eligible Americans ages 12 and up remain unvaccinated for COVID-19, according to the CDC. Karen Lincoln, associate professor, and other USC researchers explain who the unvaccinated might be, as well as the challenges in persuading people to get their shots.

  • Military sexual assault

    For members of the military who have experienced sexual assault while serving, the trauma and life-changing impacts of the violence and retaliation for reporting are crushing. Winning the battle against what Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin, III has called the “scourge of sexual assault” may not be easy, but there is a path forward, according to USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work researchers who specialize in military social work.

  • Tasha Purdue

    Each year, USC recognizes six current PhD students, and their primary advisor, with exceptional academic profiles. Tasha Perdue, graduating PhD student at the USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work, and Alice Cepeda, associate professor, are 2021 recipients of the USC PhD Achievement Award for Perdue’s dissertation work focusing on the illicit drug market in Dayton, Ohio.

  • Brain Development

    Growing up in a disadvantaged neighborhood is related to children’s brain structure and neurocognitive performance, according to a study published May 3, 2021 in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.

  • Latina Immigrant Mothers

    For several years, PhD student Abigail Palmer Molina has focused her dissertation study on the experiences of mothers participating in an intervention for maternal depression, implemented as part of the Head Start program in South Los Angeles. The majority of the mothers were Latina immigrants, and Palmer Molina looked at their experiences to provide a richer picture of the intervention's effectiveness. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit last year, she was compelled to find out how these women, and their communities, were being affected.

  • Eunhye Ahn

    Eunhye Ahn has a passion for improving the lives of children and families. Her journey to social work, however, was not a straight line. With an undergraduate degree in business, she began her professional career in the private sector and it was there that she became interested in the potential for data collection and analysis to be used for social good.