Danielle Parrish (Ph.D. ’08) is back at UT Social Work as a professor and the associate director of the Health Behavior Research and Training Institute (HBRT) – and she still can’t believe it.
“Coming back to Texas Social Work means rejoining this community and giving back what I received — meaningful, caring mentorship; excellent teaching in the classroom; and vibrant and innovative research,” she said. “I’m still pinching myself that I’m back!”
Dr. Parrish, a skilled researcher and professor, brings with her an extensive research and clinical background in substance use disorders and behavioral health. She most recently was director of the Baylor IMPACT Lab – Houston and professor at the Diana R. Garland School of Social Work at Baylor University. She also serves as the editor-in-chief for the Journal of Social Work Education, and is a co-author of a book titled “Practical Implementation in Social Work Practice,” published by Oxford University Press.
She now makes a homecoming to UT Social Work, where she is immediately hitting the ground running among familiar territory.
As associate director of HBRT, Dr. Parrish is excited to rejoin the HBRT team with Drs. Mary Velasquez and Kirk von Sternberg to conceptualize new, innovative intervention research that addresses substance use and the prevention of substance-exposed pregnancies. Dr. Parrish completed a postdoctoral fellowship at HBRT under the supervision of Drs. Velasquez and von Sternberg following her doctoral graduation in 2008.
Her interest in this area emerged from her own clinical practice experience a mental health clinician in a juvenile detention center, where Dr. Parrish noticed young women stood out most. A third of the young women in the center were visibly pregnant and Dr. Parrish noted the multiple challenges they faced as she conducted mental health assessments.
Few services met their overlapping, complex needs that often included mental health, trauma, family issues, risk of pregnancy and substance abuse challenges. In addition, the few services available were offered in silos and hard to access due to transportation, hours and unrealistic expectations for youth and families.
“I wanted to close the research-practice gap by developing more efficient interventions and finding ways to improve adoption and implementation of existing empirically supported interventions,” said Dr. Parrish. “I have been interested in working with women to prevent substance use — especially as it pertains to reducing the risk of substance-exposed pregnancy — because it is 100% preventable and can have lifelong effects on a child and the family.”
Her work with adolescents and substance use is centered on the opportunity to prevent addiction. Substance use may interrupt the natural course of brain maturation in adolescents, leading to impacts on cognitive functioning and putting youth at greater risk of addiction as an adult.
In addition to the CHOICES-TEEN study, Dr. Parrish also has five other active grants totaling more than $5.5 million in funding – and she’s still actively writing more.
“Grant writing offers a meaningful opportunity to combine real-world practice with theory and empirical research to inform the development of innovative interventions that can be tested and if efficacious, improve lives on a broader scale,” Dr. Parrish said. “Research funding is essential for carrying out high-quality intervention research. Social workers are all about applied, practical research that translates to real practice and service contexts.”