Dr. Tucker’s Behavioral Medicine Research Team focuses on developing empirically-based tools and interventions to promote patient-centered culturally sensitive health care, which broadly refers to patient-identified knowledge, behaviors, skills, and policies that are needed to effectively provide health care to culturally diverse patients. Specifically, patient-centered culturally sensitive health care involves (a) training health care providers and office staff to engage in the behaviors and display the attitudes that make patients feel comfortable with, trusting of, and respected by the health care professionals involved in their treatment; (b) modifying the physical environment of the health care facility so that patients feel welcome there, and (c) training patients in behaviors and skills that increase the likelihood that they will be treated in a culturally sensitive manner by the health care professionals involved in their treatment.
Research conducted by Dr. Tucker and her Behavioral Medicine Research Team shows that patients who receive patient-centered culturally sensitive health care tend to report high levels of heath care satisfaction, are more likely to adhere to treatment plans, and are more likely to engage in healthy behaviors.
The Behavioral Medicine Research Team has undertaken the challenge of promoting patient-centered culturally sensitive heath care as a means of reducing health disparities among low-income adults who use community health clinics for their primary health care.
Graduate Students:
Kirsten Klein
Kirsten is currently pursuing her Ph.D in Counseling Psychology at the University of Florida. She received her M.A. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Central Florida and her B.S. in Pre-Med/Psychology with a minor in Forensic Science from Loyola University New Orleans. She is currently working on her thesis focused on culturally sensitive weight loss interventions for black women with obesity.
Her research interests are:
- Health disparities (eg. cancer, diabetes, obesity & cardiovascular disease) among underserved/minority populations
- Health promotion using a community-based participatory research (CBPR) framework
- Translational and implementation science in health-care settings
In her spare time, Kirsten loves to paint, write poetry, play the piano and travel back to her home in The Bahamas.
Maggie L. Hogan
Maggie is currently enrolled in the Counseling Psychology Ph.D. program at the University of Florida. She received her Master’s in Psychology from the University of Florida and her B.S. in Psychology from the University of Oklahoma. Her Master’s thesis is entitled “Motivators of and Barriers to Physical Activity Among Adolescent Students”. She is currently working on her dissertation, which is entitled “Associations of Minority Stressors and Belongingness with Psychological Distress Among Bisexual, Pansexual, Queer, and/or Fluid Adults”.
Her research interests are:
- Health Disparities
- The impact of minority stressors on LGBTQ+ mental and physical health
- Culturally Sensitive Health Care
Congratulations to the following RA’s for receiving these awards and accomplishments!
Joelle Dorsett
2020: Invited to present a poster of her senior thesis at 2020 Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) Convention in New Orleans, Louisiana.
2020: Received admissions offers from 3 Clinical Psychology PhD programs, and a full-time paid Research Assistant job offer from the UF Department of Psychiatry.
Jessica Bui
2017: Withlacoochee River Electric Company Educational Foundation Scholarship for four years
2017-Present: Florida Bright Futures Scholarship Recipient
2019: Excellence and Leadership in Data Management Award
Kristen Santasier
August 2020: Accepted into Graduate School at Erikson Institute in Chicago. She will be working toward a Masters in Child Development with a concentration in Child Life.
Vishnu Nanduri
2018: Researcher of the Semester Award