David B Abrams

Professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences

Professional overview

Dr. David Abrams' career focuses on systems and social learning frameworks to inform population health enhancement. He has experience in testing theory, research design, measuring mechanisms of behavior change and outcome, and evaluating clinical trials (behavioral and pharmacological). His interests span topics from basic bio-behavioral mechanisms and clinical treatments to policy across risk factors and behaviors (e.g. tobacco/nicotine; alcohol, obesity, co-morbidity of medical and mental health), disease states (cancer; cardiovascular; HIV-AIDS), levels (biological, individual, organizational, worksite, community, global, and internet based), populations and disparities. His interests converge in the domain of implementation science to cost-efficiently inform evidence-based public health practice and policymaking.

Through transdisciplinary and translational research strategies, Dr. Abrams provides scientific leadership in tobacco control. His current focus is in strengthening global and United States tobacco and nicotine management strategies. Deaths of 1 billion smokers are estimated by 2100 caused overwhelmingly by use of combustible (smoked) tobacco products, not nicotine. Harm minimization is a key overarching systems strategy to speed the net public health benefit of emergent disruptive technologies for cleaner nicotine delivery. The goal is more rapid elimination of preventable deaths, disease burdens, and the widening gap in health disparities driven disproportionately by disparities in smoking.

Dr. Abrams was a professor and founding director of the Centers for Behavioral and Preventive Medicine at Brown University Medical School. He then directed the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Until 2017, he was Professor of Health Behavior and Society at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the founding Executive Director of the Schroeder National Institute of Tobacco Research and Policy Studies at Truth Initiative (formerly the American Legacy Foundation).

Dr. Abrams has published over 250 peer reviewed scholarly articles and been a Principal Investigator on numerous NIH grants. He is lead author of The Tobacco Dependence Treatment Handbook: A Guide to Best Practices. He has served on expert panels at NIH and National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine on Obesity, Alcohol Misuse and Ending the Tobacco Problem: A Blueprint for the Nation. He has also served on the Board of Scientific Advisors of the National Cancer Institute (NIH-NCI) and was President of the Society of Behavioral Medicine.

For a complete list of Dr. Abrams' published work, click here.

Education

BSc (Hons), Psychology and Computer Science, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa

MS, Clinical Psychology, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ

PhD, Clinical Psychology, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ

Postdoctoral Fellow, Brown Medical School, Providence, RI

Honors and awards

Research Laureate Award, American Academy of Health Behavior (2014)

Joseph W. Cullen Memorial Award for Tobacco Research, American Society for Preventive Oncology (2008)

Distinguished Alumni Award: Rutgers University, The Graduate School, New Brunswick, NJ (2007)

The Musiker-Miranda Distinguished Service Award, American Psychological Association (2006)

Distinguished Service Award, Society of Behavioral Medicine (2006)

Outstanding Research Mentor Award, Society of Behavioral Medicine (2006)

Book of the Year Award: Tobacco Dependence Treatment Handbook. American Journal of Nursing (2005)

Distinguished Scientist Award, Society of Behavioral Medicine (1998)

Areas of research and study

Behavioral Science

Chronic Diseases

Evaluations

Implementation and Impact of Public Health Regulations

Implementation science

Population Health

Public Health Pedagogy

Public Health Systems

Research Design

Systems Integration

Systems Interventions

Tobacco Control

Translational science

Publications

Publications

Relationships of personality and psychiatric disorders to multiple domains of smoking motives and dependence in middle-aged adults

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Smoking-cessation interventions for U.S. young adults : A systematic review

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Social network structure of a large online community for smoking cessation

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A prospective study of weight gain during the college freshman and sophomore years

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Negative affect, stress, and smoking in college students: unique associations independent of alcohol and marijuana use

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Parental smoking and adolescent smoking initiation : An intergenerational perspective on tobacco control

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Personality, psychiatric disorders, and smoking in middle-aged adults

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Social, Behavioral and Economic Research on the Federal Context

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Addressing Heavy Drinking in Smoking Cessation Treatment : A Randomized Clinical Trial

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Behavioral and Social Science Contributions to Preventing Teen Motor Crashes. Systems Integrative and Interdisciplinary Approaches

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Cigarette smoking and the lifetime alcohol involvement continuum

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Educational attainment and cigarette smoking : A causal association?

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Interdisciplinarity and Systems Science to Improve Population Health. A View from the NIH Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research

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Lifetime characteristics of participants and non-participants in a smoking cessation trial : Implications for external validity and public health impact

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Moderators of naltrexone's effects on drinking, urge, and alcohol effects in non-treatment-seeking heavy drinkers in the natural environment

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Tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana use among first-year U.S. college students : A time series analysis

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Trajectories of smoking among freshmen college students with prior smoking history and risk for future smoking : Data from the University Project Tobacco Etiology Research Network (UpTERN) study

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Bupropion and cognitive-behavioral treatment for depression in smoking cessation

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Comprehensive Smoking Cessation: Systems Integration to Save Lives and Money

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Critical Issues in eHealth Research

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Applying transdisciplinary research strategies to understanding and eliminating health disparities

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Characteristics of smokers reached and recruited to an internet smoking cessation trial : A case of denominators

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Correlates of motivation to quit smoking among alcohol dependent patients in residential treatment

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External validity : We need to do more

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Internet- vs. Telephone-administered questionnaires in a randomized trial of smoking cessation

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