Social & Behavioral Sciences

• SPH SB 730: Stress as a Public Health Problem
  Research on the impact of excessive stress indicates that it plays a significant role in physical and psychological health, in rising incidence of substance use and violence in communities, in increased absenteeism and decreased productivity in the work place, and increased medical costs. This course examines the impact of psychological, biological, environmental and social stressors on health, illness, health-risking behavior and its economic and public health consequences. Education and intervention strategies and programs involving stress management, community awareness and participation are evaluated. Through readings, lecture and discussion, students examine the field and explore its application to public health.
• SPH SB 733: Mass Communication and Public Health
  Graduate Prerequisites: SPH PH720 or instructor permission. - This course explores the use of mass communication as a tool for health promotion, both domestically and internationally. The course examines the role of the mass media in shaping a social and cultural environment that affects the public health, and then reviews a range of mass media strategies available to the practitioner--public communication campaigns, social marketing, public relations, and media advocacy. Students discuss the strengths and limitations of each approach and gain experience in applying these strategies to specific public health problems. Students work in groups on a final project in which they develop and present a proposal for a plan for a public health communication campaign that uses mass media.
• SPH SB 745: Homelessness: Stories, Solutions, and Advocacy
  Homelessness is one of the most urgent and misunderstood public health challenges of our time. This course asks a bold question: What would it take to respond differently and more effectively to homelessness in America? We examine structural roots, human consequences, and policy responses at the individual, family, community, and systems levels. Using the Mass and Cass encampment near BUSPH as a case study, alongside examples from cities across the U.S. and globally, students analyze current policies, service systems, and advocacy strategies. A central feature of the course is storytelling as a tool for public understanding and change. Students learn to translate data and lived experience into ethical, persuasive communication with assistance from guest speakers, shelter engagement, legislative advocacy, and team presentations. This class is ONLY for students ready to wrestle with complexity and lead meaningful change.
• SPH SB 747: Gun Violence and Community Health Equity
  Gun violence is a public health crisis in the U.S. that disproportionately affects communities of color. Why is this, what can be done, and how will we know whether efforts are working? This community-partnered course brings students to the frontlines of efforts to prevent gun violence and address its traumatic aftermath. We will focus on the case study of Massachusetts, where firearm death rates are low overall, but racial and ethnic disparities are vast. The course will review the epidemiology of gun violence and its legal and structural underpinnings, including segregation, disinvestment, and mass incarceration. Students will hear directly from community organizations who are working to improve services for the individuals and families most exposed to gun violence. Along the way, students will gain a critical understanding of the study designs that inform our current scientific knowledge on community gun violence interventions, including methodological skills in causal inference and quantitative program evaluation (no prior background required). For their final deliverable, students will partner with a community-based organization on a research proposal, data analysis, or other product that will advance the organization’s mission and prepare the students for community-engaged public health work.
• SPH SB 753: Preventing Sexual and Intimate Partner Violence: A Public Health Perspective
  This course addresses key topics in sexual violence and intimate partner violence, focusing on primary prevention (preventing violence before it occurs). Taking a social-ecological perspective, and informed by principles of intersectionality, lectures and discussion will address broad concepts in interpersonal violence (e.g., bystander intervention, polyvictimization) and dynamics for specific populations (e.g., LGBTQ+ people, adolescents, college students). Students will choose one of two semester-long project options: developing a workshop lesson plan or research grant proposal relevant to interpersonal violence prevention. With supportive feedback from the instructor and their peers, students will complete the course with a work product suitable for real-world practice or research. NOTE: This course addresses emotionally intense topics. Detailed descriptions of violence will be kept to a minimum. However, students considering the course should reflect on their current capacity to engage with these topics in a classroom setting.
• SPH SB 760: LGBTQ Health
  This course prepares emerging leaders to address the health inequities experienced by lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and other sexual and gender diverse (LGBTQ+) populations. Grounded in social justice and health equity frameworks, the course critically examines how structural systems of oppression—including heterosexism, racism, patriarchy, transphobia, and colonialism—shape health risks, access to care, and health outcomes across diverse LGBTQ+ communities. Students will engage with epidemiologic trends, intersectional theory, policy analysis, and community-driven research to understand LGBTQ+ health from local, national, and global perspectives. The course explores advocacy strategies, program development, and structural interventions designed to advance equitable health systems. The course adopts a strengths-based lens, highlighting how LGBTQ+ communities cultivate resilience and resistance, build social support networks, mobilize collective action, and influence policy environments for health promotion. By the end of the course, students will be equipped to design, implement, and influence policies, programs, and research initiatives that affirm LGBTQ+ lives and advance transformative change in public health practice.
• SPH SB 780: Mental Health and Public Health: A Social and Behavioral Sciences Perspective
  Graduate Prerequisites: SPH PH720 or instructor permission. This course provides an investigation into mental health and mental illness from a public health perspective. The courses examines the social determinants of mental health, and evaluates the ways in which key public health strategies (i.e., surveillance, screening, prevention, wellness promotion, community and policy advocacy) address mental health in various communities. Students develop an understanding of the challenges facing the current system of services and the role public health must play going forward. Student teams develop and apply skills by evaluating programs and strategies to promote mental health and wellbeing for vulnerable populations.
• SPH SB 785: Alcohol, Tobacco and Other Drug Use: People, Populations and Policies
  Graduate Prerequisites: SPH PH720 or instructor permission. - Alcohol, tobacco and other drug (ATOD) use is the leading cause of preventable death in the United States. Because virtually everyone has some experience with ATOD use themselves or in others, much about this topic is thought to be common knowledge, but in this course students will be surprised at the depth of scientific knowledge known that is not widely understood, in part evidenced by common policies and approaches that are not evidence-based. This course asks students to critically examine current ATOD research, policy and intervention and prevention practice, with the goal of acquiring skills with which to improve strategies to reduce ATOD-related consequences, illness and injury. Specifically, students will become well-versed in models for understanding ATOD use; gain knowledge in ATOD use across multiple populations and throughout the lifespan; understand contemporary public health debates regarding ATOD research and prevention strategies; learn how to address the deficiencies in current public health approaches to ATOD use; and be able to apply knowledge to emerging public health problems.
• SPH SB 806: Designing Strategic Interventions and Communications to Advance Public Health
  Graduate Prerequisites: SPH PH720 or instructor permission. - This core communications course focuses on 1) the development of an evidence- informed and innovative intervention and 2) the execution of a strategic and creative communications plan for a public health organization that is responsible for the intervention developed. The course also features a review of basic theory and research that can inform the health communications process as well as strategies for accessing the literature. Students are assigned a public health problem faced by a public health agency, and consult with the public health agency throughout the semester. Working through a sequence of written assignments, students conduct a literature review to inform an intervention plan, design an innovative and feasible intervention, and then prepare several materials to execute a communications strategy in support of the intervention. Communication pieces may include, but are not limited to: press release, letter to the editor, pitch letter with infographic, editorial, social media, video, website wireframes, texting campaigns and mHealth, videos, chatbots, podcasts, and press event. Writing workshops in class, skill-based exercises, and consultations with the teaching team and stakeholders are designed to give students ideas for their projects, interim feedback on their written assignments, and tools necessary to successfully develop and present a product that can be implemented by the public health agency. Students present their final project to the class and to the public health agency.
• SPH SB 818: Qualitative Research Methods
  This course provides an introduction to the use of qualitative research methods in public health. Students will gain experience in the use and application of qualitative research methods including participant observation, in-depth and key informant interviewing, focus group discussions, systematic data collection, and document analysis. Students examine different qualitative methods and techniques and learn how they can be used alone or in conjunction with quantitative methods. The course also includes attention to topics such as credibility, transferability, dependability, triangulation, site and resource identification, sampling methods, and interview and focus group guide design. Students will focus a semester-long project on a topic of their choice. Students will gain experience with basic data analysis, including coding and memoing and development of data displays. At the end of the course, students will present the results of their research and propose next steps for future research on their topic.
• SPH SB 820: Assessment and Planning for Health Promotion
  Graduate Prerequisites: SPH PH720 or instructor permission. - This course will introduce students to neighborhoods of Boston or the greater Boston area, and provide opportunities for acquiring and practicing community assessment skills with an eye toward advancing health equity. We address the fundamental question: How do public health scientists and practitioners demonstrate that a health issue in a community warrants intervention? Students will learn to consult the literature, large data sets (such as the U.S. Census, hospitalization data, vital records, and national survey data) and geographic/mapping data, as well as conduct key informant interviews or surveys and site visits to assess health promotion needs and assets of a specific neighborhood and groups. The course will culminate in the production of a community needs assessment report integrating the various sources of data gathered over the course of the semester.
• SPH SB 821: Intervention Strategies for Health Promotion
  Graduate Prerequisites: SPH PH720 or instructor permission. - This course focuses on strategic planning for public health practice. Social science approaches are included. Working in teams through a sequence of written assignments, students develop a strategic plan for a program designed to change a health behavior or a health outcome. Work in class and during team consultations are designed to give students practice with elements of the strategic planning process, ideas for their project, and interim feedback on their written assignments.
• SPH SB 822: Quantitative Methods for Program Evaluation
  This course provides an overview of the major principles and methods associated with systematic evaluation of public health programs. The overall goal is to help students develop skills needed to review, critique, plan, and conduct evaluation research. The course covers: program logic models; formative, process and outcome evaluations; threats to internal and external validity; quasi-experimental and experimental study designs; probability and non-probability sampling methods; sample size and power analysis; measurement of constructs; questionnaire development; statistical analysis strategies; and dissemination evaluation.
• SPH SB 832: Trauma, Trauma-Informed Care, Recovery & Resilience
  Graduate Prerequisites: SPHPH 720 or instructor permission. This course will provide students the opportunity to understand the public health impact of trauma (e.g., interpersonal violence, military-related, disasters) and strategies for prevention. The first part of the course is devoted to building foundational understanding of key concepts and frameworks associated with trauma-informed and equitable practices and systems from the literature. The second half of the course will focus on exploring concrete strategies for promoting resiliency/protective factors and preventing trauma/risk factors at multiple levels (individual, community, institutional, etc.). Students will apply their knowledge and skills to create a trauma-informed and equitable strategic plan for a context of their choosing (e.g., healthcare, community-based organization, education, etc.).
• SPH SB 860: Strategies for Public Health Advocacy
  Graduate Prerequisites: SPH PH720 or instructor permission. This course is for advanced MPH students. This course explores the role public health practitioners can play in advocating for programs and policies to improve the public's health and examines strategies and techniques to promote the adoption of public health policies through legislation or regulation. It first introduces the concept of advocacy and its relationship to the practice of public health. It then reviews the theory and practice of community organizing, including basic organizing philosophy, building coalitions, community empowerment, and basic strategies for community change. It then covers the public policy making process, the role of public opinion in public policy formation, the role of the news media in setting the policy agenda and in framing issues, the role of marketing and public relations in shaping public opinion, and the influence of lobbying at the federal, state, and local levels. Students learn basic skills in community organizing, grassroots mobilization, policy analysis, media advocacy, and legislative lobbying.
• SPH SB 921: Directed Studies in Social & Behavioral Sciences
  Directed studies provide the opportunity for students to explore a special topic of interest under the direction of an SPH faculty member. Directed studies with a non-SPH faculty member or an adjunct faculty member must be approved by and assigned to the department chair. Students may register for a 1, 2, 3, or 4-credit directed study by submitting a signed proposal and registration form. Students are placed in a section by the Registrar's Office according to the faculty member with whom they are working. Students may take no more than eight credits of directed study or directed research during their MPH education.
• SPH SB 922: Directed Research in Social & Behavioral Sciences
  Directed research provides the opportunity for students to explore a special topic of interest under the direction of an SPH faculty member. Directed research with a non-SPH faculty member or an adjunct faculty member must be approved by and assigned to the department chair. Students may register for 1, 2, 3, or 4 credits. To register, students must submit a signed proposal and registration form. Students are placed in a section by the Registrar's Office according to the faculty member with whom they are working. Students may take no more than eight credits of directed study or directed research during their MPH education.