A publication released in October 2016 describes collaboration within the PROTECT center between the fields of social science and environmental health. The piece specifically focuses on work completed in Puerto Rico’s northern karst region and is authored by PROTECT researchers Carmen Vélez Vega, Phil Brown, Colleen Murphy, Abigail Figueroa, José Cordero, and Akram Alshawabkeh.
This publication was featured in New Solutions, a journal known for its focus on Environmental and Occupational Health Policy, within a special issue on “Social Science-Environmental Health Collaborations.” Professor and PROTECT researcher Dr. Phil Brown and Silent Spring Institute Executive Director Dr. Julia Brody served as guest editors of this November installment which explores collaborations between environmental health scientists, social scientists, and community organizations. The compilation also highlights scientific collaboration made possible through the funding of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS).
The full “Social Science-Environmental Health Collaborations” issue of New Solutions journal can be accessed at their website.
Click here to access the full pdf of the publication, or view more details below.
Title: Community Engagement and Research Translation in Puerto Rico’s Northern Karst Region: The PROTECT Superfund Research Program
Journal: New Solutions
Publisher: SAGE journals
Date: October 2016
PROTECT Team Members Involved: Carmen Vélez Vega, Phil Brown, Colleen Murphy, Abigail Figueroa, José Cordero, Akram Alshawabkeh
Abstract:
We describe here the social science-environmental health collaboration in PROTECT, the Puerto Rico Testsite for Exploring Contamination Threats, which is one of eighteen Superfund Research Program centers funded by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. This collaboration has multiple facets: (1) create a holistic, unified research program that addresses the complexity of environmental contamination, (2) offer research participants an engaged and respectful interaction with the research team, (3) provide cross-training, in which the team’s social scientists learn environmental health and the environmental health scientists learn social science, and (4) provide training for graduate students and post-docs in multiple disciplines in this burgeoning form of collaboration.