Gilbert J. Botvin, Ph.D., a Professor of Psychology, holds a joint appointment in the Departments of Public Health and Psychiatry. Dr. Botvin has a national reputation as a behavioral scientist involved in the areas of health promotion and disease prevention, and is widely recognized as an expert in the field of tobacco, alcohol, and drug abuse prevention. He has been a productive researcher, publishing over 140 peer reviewed articles and book chapters, and presenting over 160 papers and invited addresses at national and international scientific meetings. Dr. Botvin has been a principal investigator on 20 federally-funded school-based prevention projects involving over 300 schools and 40,000 students. He is currently the principal investigator on several NIDA-funded grants including a 10-year drug abuse prevention follow-up study, a drug abuse and violence prevention trial with inner-city youth, and a center grant with collaborators at Columbia University focusing on drug abuse prevention with multi-ethnic youth.

Dr. Botvin is also Director of Weill Medical College's Institute for Prevention Research. The mission of the Institute is to promote physical and mental health, and reduce premature death and disability by focusing on the behavioral risk factors associated with many of the major public health problems. The principal activities of the Institute involve research, professional training and public education. Dr. Botvin has served as a member or consultant to numerous federal and state agencies, expert advisory panels, and NIH grant review committees. Included among these are the National Cancer Institute, the National Institute of Drug Abuse, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the US Department of Education, and the White House Office on National Drug Control Policy. In 1995, Dr. Botvin was the first prevention researcher to received a prestigious MERIT award from the National Institute on Drug Abuse an award given to the most outstanding senior scientists funded by NIH. He is also the recipient of the Society of Prevention Research's Disque Dean Presidential Award for Prevention Excellence. Finally, Dr. Botvin has been appointed by SPR to be the inaugural Editor of the Society's new journal, Prevention Science.

His current research projects include:

• Principle Investigator, Drug Abuse and Violence Prevention with Minority Youth Merit Award, 2000-2005, National Institute on Drug Abuse
  
  
• Principal Investigator, Multi-Ethnic Drug Abuse Prevention Among New York Youth, 1991-2005, National Institutes of Health
  
  
• Investigator, Rural Youth and Family Competencies Building Project, 2002-2007, National Institute on Drug Abuse/National Institute of Health
  
  
• Principal Investigator, Enhancing Implementation Fidelity in a Multi-Site Trial, 2004-2009, National Institute on Drug Abuse