Christine Steeger

Christine’s research background is in Developmental Psychology and Prevention Science. In 2013, she earned her doctorate degree in Developmental Psychology at the University of Notre Dame. In 2015, she completed a two-year NIH/NIDA T32 post-doctoral fellowship at the Yale University School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry, Division of Prevention and Community Research. Before joining the Institute of Behavioral Science in 2017, Christine was a Research Scientist in the Social Development Research Group (SDRG) at the University of Washington. Her research interests and expertise are in prevention science, developmental psychopathology, etiology of problem behaviors (risk and protective factors during development), tobacco and cannabis research, and individual-, family- and school-based interventions.

Christine is currently PI on the following projects: 1) a large-scale cluster randomized trial testing the efficacy of Botvin High School LifeSkills Training to prevent adolescent tobacco and other substance use, 2) a seed grant focused on understanding disparities in nicotine and cannabis vaping among youth, and 3) a secondary data analysis project examining the effects of flavored tobacco use on young adult and adult tobacco attitudes and use behaviors over time. Christine also works as a senior reviewer for the Blueprints for Healthy Youth Development online registry of effective preventive interventions, with a primary role of evaluating the methodological quality (focused on internal validity) of published preventive intervention research. Additionally, she collaborates on a CDC-funded project that aims to reduce violence among youth in two high-burden Denver communities using a Communities That Care (CTC) approach.