Assistant Professor, School of Social Work
Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology
School of Social Work; College of Liberal Arts
Dr. Lauren Gulbas, Assistant Professor in the Steve Hicks School of Social Work, is a medical anthropologist with expertise in the areas of culture, mental health, health disparities, and ethnographic and qualitative methods. A central component of her work explores suicidal behaviors among Latina youth. Her current research in this area examines the subtle, but significant, cultural variations that shape dynamics within Latino families and influence the etiology of suicidal behaviors. Dr. Gulbas also has an interest in understanding how family members respond to the suicide attempts of Latina teens, and how patterns in family responses after a suicide attempt are linked to mental health outcomes, such as substance use.
To this end, Dr. Gulbas is actively pursuing funding from the National Institute of Mental Health and the National Science Foundation to carry out research that will identify modifiable dimensions in family responses that could be targeted through culturally-sensitive intervention to promote the mental health of Latina teens in the aftermath of a suicide attempt. Dr. Gulbas is also currently directing a project to examine how Latino youth are engaged in behavioral health screening programs in primary care setting to identify strategies to improve screening outcomes.
View her coffee talk here.