Welcome to the Development of Addictive & Risky Behaviors Lab page. The lab is housed in the Department of Psychology at Colorado State University and trains graduate and undergraduate students in research and statistical methods.
Our Goals
Our lab seeks to understand predictors of engagement in a variety of risky behaviors. Specifically, we examine personality, genetic, and mental health underpinnings of substance use and misuse, health-risk sexual behavior, and dangerous or illegal behaviors. We conduct research with clinical, community, and college samples. Our goal is to identify risk factors which may be amenable to intervention, so as to better inform clinical and counseling work.
Contact Us
If you have questions or want to know more about the lab and the work of our students, feel free to contact us at brad.conner@colostate.edu.
About Dr. Conner
I conduct thematic research that focuses on the etiology and negative outcomes of sensation seeking, emotion dysregulation and impulsivity across the lifespan. More specifically, I study how certain genotypes and personality types influence the onset and course of disorders and the engagement in risky behaviors, such as drug misuse, risky sexual behavior, and delinquency in adolescence and young adulthood. I employ advanced multivariate statistical techniques to further understanding of the complex relations among genes, personality types, psychopathology, and risky behavior as causal mechanisms of negative outcomes such as substance dependence, contraction of sexually transmitted infections, injury, incarceration, and death. Ultimately, the goal of my research is to further understanding of how prevention and intervention efficacy vary as a function of the interplay of genetic, personality, and environmental factors.
Related to my research, I also serve as the Director for the Masters in Addictions Counseling (MAC) program. More information about the MAC program can be found at: https://psychology.colostate.edu/mac/