Ph.D. student receives grant for smoking study

A West Virginia University Ph.D. student has been awarded a grant to study the effects of smoking cigarettes on the social capital of young adults.

Traci Jarrett, who is enrolled in WVU's Public Health Sciences Program, received the $60,000 grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

Jarrett said she has worked with experts on the subject to develop a survey to gauge the social capital of young adults and how it is affected by smoking.

"Most surveys out there either target parents or children, but not young adults," she said.

Jarrett said a randomly selected sample of undergraduates will be asked to complete the survey before the end of the current school year.

In the past, studies gauging smoking's effects on social capital in adults have produced mixed results, she said.

Jarrett said she would be conducting the study with the help of Kimberly Horn, the Associate Director of Population Health Research and head of the Translational Tobacco Reduction Research Program.

"This grant is particularly important to me because it reflects a major accomplishment of a student for whom I am a mentor and advisor.," Horn said. "It is exciting to see her hard work and dedication pay off as an emerging scientist and colleague."

Jarrett said she hopes the results of the study will help students to make healthier choices.

"If we can understand how developing ties to the campus community are associated with smoking behaviors, it can provide key insights to campus administrators as to how to develop campus-community interventions to prevent students from starting to smoke, or to help them reduce or quit smoking," Jarrett said.