What is ResearchWell?
ResearchWell regularly conducts research in support of HCI goals and objectives. ResearchWell has provided ongoing research and evaluation assistance to HCI pods in the areas of study design, IRB approval, data collection, survey development, and data analysis.
ResearchWell Leadership
Burton Cowgill, Ph.D., ResearchWell Faculty, Pod Leader
Dr. Cowgill is the Center Project Director for the UCLA Center for Prevention Research and has extensive experience working with community-based organizations in the design, implementation, and evaluation of research projects following the principles of community-based participatory research (CBPR). Dr. Cowgill received his PhD from the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health in 2007 from the Department of Health Policy and Management in Health Care Outcomes Research. Dr. Cowgill’s research addresses adolescent risk behaviors, including tobacco and e-cigarette use, nutrition and physical activity, and HPV vaccine uptake. He is also interested in how federal, state, and local policies influence health behaviors. Dr. Cowgill teaches courses on Healthy Policy and Health Care Organization and Financing.
Prior to returning to academic research, Dr. Cowgill served as a fellow for Senator Edward Kennedy’s Health Committee staff, working on passage of the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), and as an analyst for the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).
During his time with CMS, Dr. Cowgill worked with state Medicaid agencies on child and adolescent immunization performance measurement and quality improvement projects and funding for immunization registries. He is experienced in both quantitative and qualitative research and analytical techniques.
Michael K. Ong, M.D., Ph.D., Pod Leader
Michael K. Ong, M.D., Ph.D. is an Associate Professor at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine in Los Angeles, California and Chair of the Tobacco-Free Steering Committee. His research interests focus on improving the delivery of appropriate and efficient health care by general internal medicine physicians. His research has applied this focus in several areas of general medicine, including hospital-based care, mental health, and tobacco control. He is currently Chair of the State of California Tobacco Education and Research Oversight Committee, which oversees programs funded by Proposition 99 including the California Tobacco Control Program.
Janet Tomiyama, Ph.D., Pod Leader
A. Janet Tomiyama, Ph.D., is Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of California, Los Angeles and Director of the DIeting, Stress, and Health (DiSH) laboratory (www.dishlab.org). She received her B.A. in Psychology from Cornell University in 2001 and her Ph.D. in Social Psychology at the University of California, Los Angeles in June of 2009, and completed a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health & Society Scholar Fellowship jointly at the University of California San Francisco and Berkeley. Her work has been recognized by early career awards from the Association for Psychological Science, the Society for Behavioral Medicine, and the Society for Health Psychology. Her research, which has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, focuses on the biobehavioral and health consequences of stress, dieting, comfort eating, and weight stigma.
Anusha Fatehpuria, ResearchWell Undergraduate Student Researcher
Anusha Fatehpuria is a third year Human Biology and Society major and Global Health minor, interested in pursuing a career in public health and medicine. She is interested in how various determinants and disparities can affect people’s health outcomes and how this information can be used to design interventions and treatments. Outside of HCI, Anusha is involved with SCOPE – Patient Health Advocates, the Sumner Stress Lab, and the Regents Scholar Society at UCLA. She is excited to advocate for student wellbeing on campus through her work with the ResearchWell pod!
