Center for Mind-Body Research

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The proposed Johns Hopkins Center for Mind-Body Research (CMBR) will unite internationally recognized state-of-the-art expertise and a cross-disciplinary leadership structure to develop a strong, productive intellectual community for mind-body researchers. The themes for the CMBR include examining emotional and cognitive processes affecting health-related outcomes, psychobiological mechanisms linking these processes to health, the contribution of these processes to understanding health disparities, and interventions to change these processes. Our group is diverse and spread across three schools and two academic institutions in the Baltimore area. The proposed CMBR will bring together 35 faculty from 15 departments from medicine, dentistry, nursing, and public health. The proposed Center focuses on many health outcomes, consistent with current understanding that multiple emotional and cognitive processes are similar across diseases and have broad effects on health. Our current projects encompass a number of chronic illnesses, including asthma, cardiovascular disease, asthma, and rheumatoid arthritis, and health-related outcomes, including pain, fatigue, and disability. The CMBR will include Administrative/Planning, Training, and Measurement/Statistics Cores which will provide shared resources for conceptualizing, implementing, analyzing, and evaluating innovative research that integrates mental and physical dimensions of health. The Administrative Core includes a Project Development Program to facilitate collaborations both within and outside the CMBR. This Core will oversee the work of the Center and plan for Center growth and future collaborations. The Training Core will organize seminars, a Visiting Scholars program award Faculty Training stipends, and a Mentoring program. The Measurement & Statistics Core will provide innovative measurement and statistical technologies to CMBR faculty and trainees. We have generated strong institutional support for our developing Center by involving faculty from the highest level of the university in overseeing and advising the creation of this Center. The overall goals of the CMBR are to create a fertile intellectual community that facilitates productive cross-disciplinary collaborations in mind-body research and to apply innovative research methodologies to elucidate psychobiological mechanisms linking emotional and cognitive processes with health and illness and to foster the development and evaluation of mind-body interventions aimed at improving health.