BRIAN BAUCOM, PH.D.
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Associate PROFESSOR, CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY
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Research Interests
My research is focused on understanding how partners in committed, romantic relationships interact to promote vs. inhibit the well-being and stability of their relationship as well as the individual physical and mental health of one another. I conduct basic and applied research with a particular emphasis on couples and families coping with psychological distress, psychopathology, and chronic health conditions. My work integrates multiple modalities of assessment including self-report, daily diary, psychophysiology, cognitive performance tasks, observational coding methods, speech signal processing methods (e.g., f0) and natural language processing. I have been fortunate to receive funding for this work from national and international agencies and foundations including the Department of Defense, National Science Foundation, multiple institutes of the National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Justice, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft e.V (German Science Foundation), the Israeli Science Foundation, and Apple.
Clinical Interests
My clinical interests are focused on increasing access to empirically supported psychotherapies, particularly for underserved and underresourced populations. I co-direct the Behavioral Health Innovation and Dissemination Center with Dr. Feea Leifker where we offer low fee, empirically supported psychotherapies to individual adults and couples and train and supervise graduate students from Clinical Psychology, Counseling Psychology, and Social Work as well as Psychiatry Residents and Triple-Board Psychiatry Fellows in learning and providing these psychotherapies to all residents of Utah.
Opportunities for Students
Our research group is currently conducting or involved in a number of interdisciplinary projects on many different aspects of couple interaction. These projects include studies of couple- or family-based interventions to reduce risk for suicide and for HIV , to treat PTSD, Anorexia Nervosa, and Binge Eating Disorder, and to assist couples in making health behavior changes in the context of cancer, sleep apnea, and stroke.
Another major focus of our research group is the development of computational tools and statistical models for studying couple interaction. Most current projects involve collaboration with colleagues from a number of disciplines such as electrical engineering and biostatistics. As a result, our research group is active in a number of areas outside of clinical psychology including speech signal processing, affective computing, computational linguistics, and statistical modeling for multiply nested designs. These aspects of the lab make it an excellent fit for students with backgrounds both within and outside of clinical psychology, students with interests in couple interaction, couple therapy, and behavior & emotion, and creative thinkers who are excited about interdisciplinary collaboration.
I will be accepting applications from potential graduates who would start in Fall, 2023. Our lab is also accepting applications for a limited number of volunteer RA positions that have a variable start date; if interested, please contact Abby Boggins to apply and for further information about opportunities in our lab.
Education
Postdoctoral Fellowship, University of Southern California (Clinical and Quantitative
Psychology, Electrical Engineering, 2008-2012)
Ph.D., University of California, Los Angeles (Clinical Psychology, 2008)
Internship, Veterans Administration, Los Angeles (APA-Accredited Clinical Psychology
Internship, 2007-2008)
M.A., University of California, Los Angeles (Clinical Psychology, 2003)
B.S., Vanderbilt University (Psychology, 2000)
B.S., Vanderbilt University (Engineering Science, 2000)
Selected Publications
Baron, K. G., Gilles, A., Sundar, K. M., Baucom, B. R., Duff, K., & Troxel, W. (2022). Rationale and study protocol for We-PAP: a randomized pilot/feasibility trial of a couples-based intervention to promote PAP adherence and sleep health compared to an educational control. Pilot and Feasibility Studies, 8(1), 171.
Baucom, B. R., Georgiou, P., Bryan, C. J., Garland, E. L., Leifker, F., May, A., ... & Narayanan, S. S. (2017). The promise and the challenge of technology-facilitated methods for assessing behavioral and cognitive markers of risk for suicide among US Army National Guard Personnel. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 14(4), 361. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph14040361
Baucom, B. R. W., Leo, K., Adamo, C., Georgiou, P., & Baucom, K. J. W. (2017). Conceptual and statistical issues in couples observational research: Rationale and methods for design decisions. Journal of Family Psychology, 31(8), 972–982. https://doi.org/10.1037/fam0000370
MY CURRENT GRADUATE STUDENTS
MY CURRENT POSTDOCTORAL FELLOWS
MY FORMER GRADUATE STUDENTS
Colin Adamo. Postdoctoral Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania
Alex Crenshaw. Assistant Professor at Kennesaw State University
Jasara Hogan. Assistant Research Scientist at New York University
Karena Leo. Postdoctoral Scholar at Duke University
Kelsi Rugo. Research Associate and Therapist at the Behavioral Health Innovation and Dissemination Center at the University of Utah
Nick Perry. Research Assistant Professor at the University of Denver
MY FORMER POSTDOCTORAL FELLOWS
Alexis May. Assistant Professor at Wesleyan University.
Feea Leifker. Research Assistant Professor and Co-Director of the Behavioral Health Innovation and Dissemination Center at the University of Utah