Jim Thrasher, Ph.D.
Jim Thrasher is a Professor in the Department of Health Promotion, Education & Behavior
in the Arnold School of Public Health at the University of South Carolina. For almost
two decades, he also has been a Researcher and Visiting Professor at the Mexican National
Institute of Public Health, where much of his research is based. His research projects
assess the effects of media and policy on eating and tobacco use across countries.
In recognition of his research productivity and impact on science and policy – both
nationally and internationally – he received the World Health Organization’s World
No Tobacco Day Award in 2016. He is also on the Food and Drug Administration’s Tobacco
Products Scientific Advisory Committee, which provides information and recommendations
to the FDA Commissioner around tobacco product regulation.
Minji Kim, Ph.D.
Minji Kim is an assistant professor in the Department of Health Promotion, Education
& Behavior. Her research focuses on targeted and tailored health communication. Recent
projects include assessing impact of targeted tobacco marketing messages on young
people, examining tobacco-related social media content, and developing and testing
culturally targeted anti-tobacco messages for Asian Americans.
Desiree Vidaña-Pérez, Ph.D.
Dr. Vidaña-Pérez is a postdoctoral research associate at the Department of Health
Promotion Education, and Behavior. Her research interests include exploring the factors
associated to non-daily smoking among adults, the use of electronic cigarettes and
other nicotine products among youth, incorporating a gender perspective and novel
methodologies. Her recent work has focused mainly on identifying the factors associated
to use of electronic cigarettes among adolescents in Latin America. She has worked
with Dr. Thrasher since 2022.
Lizeth Cruz Jiménez, Ph.D.
Lizeth Cruz Jiménez holds a Bachelor's degree in Social Psychology and a Master's
in Health Sciences in Mexico (INSP). Currently, she is a Ph.D. candidate in Health
Promotion, Education, and Behavior at the University of South Carolina. She has been
actively involved in the planning, developing, and disseminating research projects
related to tobacco product consumption patterns in Mexico in collaboration with the
National Institute of Public Health in Mexico (INSP). Lizeth is particularly interested
in designing and evaluating programs using quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods
approaches.
Sam Petillo, B.S.
Farahnaz Islam is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Biostatistics. She is
interested in the analysis of revealed preference data collected from discrete choice
experiments, having conducted these studies in a variety of countries (i.e., Australia,
Canada, US, Mexico, Guatemala). Her dissertation aims to bridge the gap between the
theoretical foundation and validation of this method, while assisting tobacco control
researchers with its practical application.
Charity Ntansah, MPH
Charity Ntansah is a doctoral student in in the Department of Health Promotion, Education,
and Behavior. She is conducting research on ways to leverage communication to promote
healthy behaviors like smoking cessation among minority and vulnerable groups. Prior
to UofSC, Charity worked as a health communication specialist on several national
campaigns and participated in CDC’s Zika Pregnancy and Birth Defects Task force as
an ORISE fellow.
Adebusola Ogunnaike, MPH
Adebusola Ogunnaike is a doctoral student in in the Department of Health Promotion,
Education, and Behavior. She is passionate about reducing Non-Communicable Diseases,
particularly in low- and middle-income countries. Prior to enrolling at the UofSC,
Adebusola worked on tobacco control issues in the Nigerian Ministry of Health and
led tobacco control advocacy trainings in several African countries.
Emily Loud, MPH
Emily Loud is a doctoral student in the Department of Health Promotion, Education,
and Behavior. Her interests include tobacco control, health communication, and global
health, with specific interests in health literacy and risk perceptions associated
with tobacco use. Before joining the HPEB department as an MPH student, Emily served
in the Peace Corps in Rwanda from 2016-2018.
Farahnaz Islam, MSPH
Farahnaz Islam is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Biostatistics. She is
interested in the analysis of revealed preference data collected from discrete choice
experiments, having conducted these studies in a variety of countries (i.e., Australia,
Canada, US, Mexico, Guatemala). Her dissertation aims to bridge the gap between the
theoretical foundation and validation of this method, while assisting tobacco control
researchers with its practical application
Emily Hackworth, MPH
Emily E. Hackworth is a doctoral student in the Department of Health Promotion, Education,
and Behavior at the University of South Carolina. Before joining the HPEB department
as an MPH student in 2019, Emily served in the Peace Corps in Rwanda from 2016-2018.Emily’s
research interests include tobacco control policies and communication, nicotine, mental
health, and youth vaping. Her dissertation research aims to examine the relationship
between mental health and nicotine use among adolescents over the course of the COVID-19
pandemic.
Aishwarya Khemkar
I am a first year PhD student at the department of Health Promotion, Education and
Behavior. My research interests are to understand the initiation of tobacco use, Smokelesss
tobacco, and Tobacco harm perceptions
Liyan Xiong, MS
Liyan Xiong is a Doctoral Student in the Department of Biostatistics. She supports
the team’s analyses through ecological momentary assessment. This work has some common
with her professional interests in longitudinal data analysis, statistical methods
in mixed effect model, and statistical programming.
Dai Fang, MS
Emily E. Hackworth is a doctoral student in the Department of Health Promotion, Education,
and Behavior at the University of South Carolina. Before joining the HPEB department
as an MPH student in 2019, Emily served in the Peace Corps in Rwanda from 2016-2018.Emily’s
research interests include tobacco control policies and communication, nicotine, mental
health, and youth vaping. Her dissertation research aims to examine the relationship
between mental health and nicotine use among adolescents over the course of the COVID-19
pandemic.
Winnie Ni, BSPH
Winnie Ni is a Masters student in the Department of Health Promotion, Education, and
Behavior. Her research interests include tobacco control, communication, and vaping
behavior and cessation among young adults. Additionally, she is also interested in
working with disadvantaged and vulnerable populations as reflected with her internship
at Darkness to Light focusing on child sexual abuse prevention.
Anna Mobley
Anna Mobley is an undergraduate Social Work student in the Honors College here at
the University of South Carolina. She is currently involved in the Carolina Health
and Relationship Mechanisms Lab as well as NCDPCR which both reflect her interests
in advocacy for individuals with substance use disorders. She is also interested in
creating more equitable and effective health policies.
University of South Carolina
Rachel Davis, MPH, Ph.D.
Rachel Davis is an Associate Professor in the Department of Health Promotion, Education
and Behavior. Her research uses qualitative and quantitative methods to better understand
how culture, race, and ethnicity influence health communication and survey methodology,
with a particular focus on working with Latinx and African American populations.
Her research with Dr. Thrasher’s team had evaluated the effectiveness of cigarette
warning labels and cessation messages across diverse populations, as well as international
research on the health equity impact of food policies.
James Hardin, Ph.D.
James Hardin is a Professor of Biostatistics whose research involves correlated data
analysis, including generalized estimating equations and mixed models. He also actively
researches discrete data regression models including bivariate outcomes for which
joint probabilities may be estimated using copula functions. He has worked with Dr.
Thrasher on a variety of NIH-funded projects.
Sei-hill Kim, Ph.D.
Sei-Hill Kim is a Professor in the School of Journalism and Mass Communications whose
research interests are at the intersection of the media and social issues, particularly
as they relate to public health, science, politics, and public relations. He examines
how these issues are presented in the media and the effects these representations
have on key audience segments. His work with Dr. Thrasher has focused on media coverage
of tobacco policies, including regulation of novel tobacco products, in the context
of the US and South Korea.
Andrea Henderson, Ph.D.
Andrea K. Henderson is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology. Her
research focuses on the role of religion among minoritized populations, especially
Black Americans, in the face of major life events, stress and racial discrimination.
She has been studying how religiosity may explain the differential impact of tobacco
control policies across minority and majority groups in the US.
National Institute of Public Health, Mexico
Edna Arillo Santillán, MS
Edna Arillo-Santillán is a Research Professor in the Department of Tobacco Research
at the National Institute of Public Health (INSP) in Mexico. For 20 years, she has
been conducting research to evaluate school and federal policies to prevent tobacco
use in Mexico, with a particular focus on tobacco warning label policy.
Rosibel Rodríguez-Bolaños, MD, MS, Ph.D.
Rosibel Rodríguez-Bolaños, PhD is a Research Professor in the Department of Tobacco
Research at the National Institute of Public Health (INSP) in Mexico. Her tobacco
control research takes a gender perspective on adolescents and adult smokers in Mexico,
including using text messages to promote smoking cessation. Her current research
focuses on smoking, e-cigarette use, and other substance use among sexual minorities
in Mexico.
Katia Gallegos-Carrillo, Ph.D.
Katia Gallegos-Carrillo is an investigator in the Epidemiology and Health Services
Research Unit of the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS). Her research assesses
and develop interventions that reduce non-communicable disease by addressing key behavioral
risk factors like physical activity, diet, and smoking. She is particularly interested
in binational approaches that compare Mexico and the US.
Inti Barrientos-Gutierrez, MBA
Inti Barrientos-Gutierrez is a Researcher in the Center for Research in Evaluation
and Surveys of the Mexican National Institute of Public Health (INSP). His research
is focused on product placement and advertising of tobacco products, nicotine consumption
in adolescents, and new forms of nicotine consumption.
Lizeth Cruz Jiménez, MS
Liz Cruz-Jiménez is a Researcher in the Center for Research in Evaluation and Surveys
of the Mexican National Institute of Public Health (INSP). Lizeth has participated
in the planning, development, and dissemination of research projects related to the
consumption patterns of tobacco products and the sexual health of adolescents. She
is a special interest in preventive health and also in the design and evaluation of
programs with quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methodological approaches.