Dr. Tucker's two research teams (i.e., the Behavioral
Medicine Research Team and the Health Psychology
Research Team) implement her ambitious research agenda
while providing invaluable “real world,” hands-on
research training experiences to over 60 undergraduate
students and up to 8 graduate students each year. All
members of Dr. Tucker’s research teams learn how to
conduct culturally sensitive, community participatory,
qualitative and quantitative research by being involved
in all aspects of the research process. The research
attitudes, knowledge, and skills acquired by members of
Dr. Tucker’s research teams help realize her aspiration
of preparing the next generation of first-rate,
culturally sensitive researchers. Below are descriptions
of Dr. Tucker’s two research teams.
BEHAVIORAL MEDICINE RESEARCH
TEAM
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.
The Behavioral Medicine Research Team currently is
implementing the Health-Smart Church
Program.
HEALTH PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH
TEAM
Dr. Tucker’s Health
Psychology Research Team investigates psychological and
behavioral factors associated with attaining and
maintaining health.
Initial research conducted by this team focused on
health-risk and health promoting behaviors among
culturally diverse youth living with at least one
chronic illness and living in low-income families (each
youth’s mother also participated). This 18-month study
(called the Children’s Health Self-Empowerment Project)
was funded by the Florida Department of Health and
implemented in conjunction with Children’s Medical
Services in Gainesville, Florida. Findings from this
study indicated that the effects of a workshop
intervention differed for African Americans as compared
to White Americans relative to various health promoting
behaviors (e.g., eating a nutritious diet).
Subsequently, Dr. Tucker was awarded a 3-year grant by
the PepsiCo Foundation to build on and extend the focus
of the Children’s Health Self-Empowerment Project. The
goal of this recently completed multiphase research
study (called the Family Health Self-Empowerment
Project) was to evaluate a comprehensive set of
integrated interventions designed to modify and prevent
overweight and obesity among children, adolescents, and
adults.
One important focus of the
Health Psychology Research Team has been to develop and
empirically test Dr. Tucker’s literature-informed,
culturally sensitive Health Self-Empowerment Theory,
which asserts that health promoting behavior can be
predicted by the following five health-related
psychological variables: health motivation, health
self-efficacy, health self-praise, active coping skills,
and health responsibility. Findings from the Children’s
Health Self-Empowerment Project provided support for
Health Self-Empowerment Theory in terms of predicting
health promoting behavior among (a) culturally diverse
youth living with at least one chronic illness and
living in low-income families and (b) these youths’
mothers. These research findings informed the
development of culturally sensitive health
self-empowerment theory-based health promotion
interventions which were then tested in the Family
Health Self-Empowerment Project.
Currently, the Health Psychology Research Team is in
the process of launching the Clinic Staff Health-Smart Behavior
Program.
