Noteworthy: Research grants, awards and publications

ALBANY, N.Y. (April 25, 2024) — The latest developments on University at Albany faculty and staff who are receiving research grants, awards and other noteworthy attention.

• Carl J. Bon Tempo, associate professor in the Department of History, won an Organization of American Historians/Japanese Association of American Studies Japan Residencies Fellowship for 2024. As part of the two-week fellowship, Bon Tempo will give six lectures in Japan from May 23 to June 8 on topics related to 20th century American political history, with a special focus on immigration and refugee history, human rights history and recent American politics.
• Margaret Gullick, director of UAlbany’s Center for Human Services Research, has received $180,000 from the Catholic Family Center of Rochester to support the “Kinship Navigator System of Care Evaluation” project. The research is examining federally approved kinship support programs to help determine which program best matches local program implementation across New York State. The project also is assessing the state’s new “Kinship Champion” program to better understand its implementation and impacts to resource access for caregivers.
• Marina A. Petrukhina, Carla Rizzo Delray Professor of Chemistry, received $514,366 from the National Science Foundation for her project, “Contorted and Strained Molecular Nanographenes: Multi-Electron Storage and Reduction-Induced Transformations.” The three-year award will fund an investigation aiming to improve understanding of charge-transfer effects in the emerging classes of highly warped and twisted nanocarbon scaffolds to promote their use in energy storage, conducting and quantum computing devices.
• Jennifer Manganello, professor at the School of Public Health, received $15,000 from UPenn’s Annenberg Public Policy Center for a new research project to examine the potential for integrating AI tools such as chatbots into state and local government websites to reduce administrative hurdles that can make it difficult to access essential services. The work will focus on state developmental disabilities offices and will be conducted with a collaborator at the University of Delaware. Mila Gascó-Hernandez, research director at the Center for Technology in Government, is contributing to the project.
• Cynthia Najdowski, associate professor and area head in the Department of Psychology, was awarded the 2023 Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues Gordon Allport Intergroup Relations Prize for her 2022 paper “Toward a psychological science of abolition democracy: Insights for improving theory and research on race and public safety," published in the journal Social Issues and Policy Review. Najdowski shares the award with collaborator Phil Solomon of Yale University. Najdowski also recently published “Effects of dehumanization and disgust-eliciting language on attitudes toward immigration: a sentiment analysis of Twitter data” in the journal Psychiatry, Psychology and Law. The study used Twitter data, machine learning and sentiment analysis to examine the role of social media in shaping feelings towards immigrants in the U.S.
• Wim Van den Noortgate, a professor of statistics and methodology at KU Leuven in Belgium who is here as a visiting scholar, will deliver a seminar titled “Many cents make dollars: Network meta-analysis of single-case studies,” on Friday from 12:30-1:45 p.m. in Catskill 204 and via Zoom. Presented by associate professor Mariola Moeyaert and the Department of Educational & Counseling Psychology, the seminar will explore the use of multilevel meta-analytic models for single-case experimental designs in research.