My principal career goal is to become an expert in how tobacco product characteristics influence tobacco use behavior using novel laboratory, survey, and qualitative methodologies. My goal for this K01 Career Development Award in Tobacco Control Regulatory Research is to obtain the training to research how product characteristics, namely tobacco product abuse liability and appeal, affect tobacco use behavior. To gain this knowledge and requisite research skills, I propose mentorship, didactic training, and experiential learning through research focused on the behavioral pharmacology of addiction and human laboratory research methods. The proposed research will contribute to FDA tobacco regulation by identifying the initial differential effects of ciga-like and pen-like ECIGs on ECIG experimentation and subsequent tobacco cigarette smoking behavior. To our knowledge, this will be the first study to combine clinical laboratory and real-world data collection of ECIG experimentation in smokers, as well as the first to compare explicitly the effect of the two major ECIG device types. Results will directly address the issues of ECIG abuse liability, nicotine exposure, and reinforcing efficacy. This research will also begin the work necessary to understand the effect of ECIG availability on subsequent tobacco cigarette smoking quit attempts. This study will be my first experience with primary data collection using human lab methods and my application of the effect of tobacco abuse liability and appeal on tobacco use behavior. Additionally, this research will compliment and expand upon my concurrent social and behavioral research on the impact of norms and harm perceptions on ECIG experimentation and combusted tobacco use. With outstanding mentors (Drs. Ray Niaura and Tom Eissenberg) who are committed to my training and believe in the importance of my proposed research, as well as strong institutional support from the Schroeder Institute, I am poised to develop into an independent and highly productive research investigator. This Career Development Award would enable me to devote 75% of my time to didactic training in behavioral pharmacology, develop expertise training in clinical laboratory methods to complement my skills in survey research, and write an R01 research proposals to launch my career as an independent investigator in tobacco regulatory science.
My goal for this K01 Career Development Award in Tobacco Control Regulatory Research is to obtain the training to research how product characteristics, namely e-cigarette abuse liability and appeal, affect tobacco use behavior. To gain this knowledge and requisite research skills, I propose mentorship, didactic training, and experiential learning through research focused on the behavioral pharmacology of addiction and human laboratory research methods. With outstanding mentors (Drs. Ray Niaura and Tom Eissenberg) who are committed to my training and believe in the importance of my proposed research, as well as strong institutional support from the Schroeder Institute, I am poised to develop into an independent and highly productive research investigator.
