Biography

Dr. Lisa Benz Scott earned a B.A. in Psychology from Stony Brook University, an M.S. in Health Promotion from Purdue University, and a Ph.D. from the Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health in the Department of Health Policy and Management's Division of Social and Behavioral Sciences as a National Research Service Award pre-doctoral trainee recipient (National Heart Lung and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health). Dr. Benz Scott continued her studies at Johns Hopkins as a post-doctoral W.K. Kellogg Community Health Scholar to establish herself as expert in community-based participatory research principles and methods. Prior to arriving at Stony Brook as an Assistant Professor in 2002, Dr. Benz Scott was a Research Scientist for a health behavior research think-tank in Washington, D.C., the Center for the Advancement of Health, where she managed and implemented projects to promote the integration of evidence-based behavioral interventions into health care settings (2000-2002). Lisa was appointed the Director of the Program in Public Health and Associate Dean of Health Sciences at Stony Brook Medicine in 2012, and promoted to Full Professor (with tenure) in 2015. She oversees an exceptional faculty of 15 public health researchers, educators, and practitioners, and together they offer several graduate-level degrees and advanced certificates in addition to addressing leading public health priorities at the local, national, and/or international levels. Her current research is dedicated to gender and race/ethnicity disparities in cardiac rehabilitation access and utilization. She also is interested in research that falls at the intersection between social psychology, health communication, and health behavior change. She serves locally on the Ryan White HIV Council for Long Island and the Strategic Assessment and Planning Committee, as well as the Long Island Health Collaborative. In her personal life, she enjoys spending time with two very active teen daughters, visiting friends and family, and relaxing with her NewFoundland canine companion.