The National Science Foundation (NSF) recently announced it would award $18.3 million across 16 projects to researchers funded by the National Science Foundation's Dynamics of Integrated Socio-Environmental Systems (CNH2) program.
ISER researchers study a range of health-related issues, from costs of healthcare to ways of reducing suicide rates and measures of children’s well-being. They also evaluate health programs. Our capacity to study issues related to Alaskans’ health was expanded in 2015, when the Center for Behavioral Health Research and Services became a part of ISER.
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Institute of Social and Economic Research (ISER) Assistant Professor of Economics, Dr. Kevin Berry, recently published a report for Bike Anchorage and the Municipality of Anchorage estimating and evaluating the impact of organized promotional events on the number of individuals cycling to work in Anchorage, Alaska, specifically “Bike to Work Day” (BTWD).
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The Institute of Social and Economic Research’s (ISER) Dr. Mouhcine Guettabi, Associate Professor of Economics, was recently published in Scientific American where he discussed his recent research and results on the impact of universal basic income (UBI) on childhood obesity. The article drew from a longer report which Dr. Guettabi co-authored with Drs. Brett Watson and Matthew Reimer.
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Diane King, Director of the Center for Behavioral Health Research and Services (CBHRS) within ISER, along with Bridget Hanson, Research Associate Professor and Alexandra Edwards, Research Professional, recently attended the Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASDs) Grantee Meeting in Atlanta, Georgia. The meeting, hosted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, focused on sharing innovative practices and disseminating findings from across the country related to preventing and addressing FASDs.
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Kevin Berry, assistant professor of economics at ISER, writes in The Hill about the importance of long-term investments in health capacity to prevent and quickly respond to disease outbreaks, such as the recent Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
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Anchorage Climate Action Plan collaborators, including UAA and ISER faculty, are sponsoring a lunchtime talk Friday, August 9 in the ISER conference room, by Illinois Research Climatologist Ashish Sharma on how the most vulnerable in urban settings can be better protected from climate-related health challenges. As extreme weather becomes the norm, the number of heat-related deaths around the world continues to rise, causing the media to coin the phrase, “heat, the silent killer.”&
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A new study of the Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend (PFD) program shows that an additional $1,000 PFD decreases the probability of an Alaskan child being obese by as much as 4.5 percentage points, translating to about a 22% reduction in obesity.
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In Alaska, alcohol is a casual or contributing factor in 9 of the top 10 causes of death and is involved in a quarter of all accidents requiring hospitalization. ISER’s Center for Behavioral Health Research & Services (CBHRS) is working with health care providers in Alaska and outside of Alaska to promote the use of SBIRT, an evidence-based protocol that helps reduce alcohol misuse and dependence.
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Jodi Barnett, project manager for ISER’s Center for Behavioral Health Research & Services, is lead author of a new paper in Health Promotion Practice discussing the important role that Alaska youth culture camps have in locally driven and multilevel suicide prevention.
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ISER researcher and Alaska Public Health Association board member Katie Cueva shared evaluation findings (PDF, 513KB) from cancer education work with Alaska's Community Health Aides/Practitioners (CHAPS) at the 2019 Alaska Health Summit in Anchorage, January 22-24. In the session, "The Relationship between Body Weight and Cancer Risk in Alaska," Dr. Cueva discussed how "learners'" end-of-module surveys in a CHAPS cancer education online program indicated that participating in an online cancer education module on physical activity, nutrition, and cancer, helped "learners" feel more comfortable talking about cancer in their communities, helped "learners" to talk about cancer more often with their patients, and supported "learners" to plan to reduce their own cancer risk by things like moving more and eating healthier. CHAPS is part of the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium.