Academic Background:

1990: University of Montana , Ph.D., Clinical Psychology

1984: University of Wisconsin-Madison, B.A., Psychology and History

 
Professional Interests:

My professional interests are in cultural psychology, which attempts to understand people as cultural beings through their own indigenous psychological perspectives, and rural community psychology, which actively works to enhance the strengths and quality of life in rural communities.

Teaching:

I have taught undergraduate courses in lifespan developmental psychology, abnormal psychology, cross-cultural psychology, community psychology, and senior seminar. I have taught graduate courses in rural and Alaska psychology, multicultural psychopathology, multicultural psychological assessment, counseling and psychotherapy, community interventions for serious mental illness, and family therapy.

Practice:

Right now, in my practice I work in partnerships with rural Alaska Native communities on prevention projects to foster sobriety and reasons for living in youth. I am also interested in training psychologists for rural work. As a clinician, I am particularly interested in approaches that allow people with serious mental illness to live comfortably in their community, in culturally responsive individual and family therapy for youth and adults, and in multicultural psychological assessment.

Research:

My research interests include development of culturally grounded preventative and health services for Alaska Natives, resiliency processes among Alaska Native and other circumpolar people, multicultural practice, adaptive cultural and intergenerational responses to trauma, and seasonal behavior variation in the Arctic .

Our university research group collaborates in community partnership on a participatory research project. Together, we are testing a prevention program that promotes youth reasons for living and sobriety in Alaska Native rural villages. We hope to establish it as the first culturally-based empirically-supported practice for Alaska Natives. Over the past decade, Alaska Native people from throughout Alaska collaborated on research that developed an understanding of Alaska Native pathways to sobriety and reasons for living. Our community collaborators have used this knowledge to design of a culturally based prevention program and we are testing it in a National center for Minority Health Disparities funded prevention trial. We are also collaborating on a National Science Foundation funded international study of the resiliency processes of circumpolar indigenous youth. Here we seek to understand the locally defined successful pathways to adulthood of young people from remote circumpolar indigenous communities. How do we best train culturally competent providers to provide services and assessment in our diverse, global community? This is the topic of some of my recent publications. While a Fulbright scholar at the University of Oslo , I studied the experience of trauma among international refugees from the perspective of cultural psychology, and in Alaska , we continue to explore involuntary acculturation and group traumatic experience among Indigenous people. Finally, we do research on Seasonal Affective Disorder or winter depression, which can be a serious problem for many people living as extreme latitudes and on seasonal behavior variation in the Arctic.

Selected Publications:

Selected peer-reviewed publications (in chronological order)

Nelson, C. & Allen, J. (1994). Effects of maternal hospitalization in early childhood: Anticipated anxiety associated with separation for childbirth and surgery. Journal of Pediatric Psychology, 19, 629-642.

Allen, J., Walsh, J.A., Murphy, K.C., & Seekins, T. (1995). Rural multidisciplinary pain center follow-up study:   Evaluation with a no-treatment comparison group. American Journal of Pain Management. 5, 126-132.

Dana, R., Conner, M.G., & Allen, J. (1996). Quality of care and cost-containment in managed mental health: Policy, education, research, advocacy. Psychological Reports, 79, 1395-1422.

Allen, J. (1998). Personality assessment with American Indians and Alaska Natives: Instrument considerations and service delivery style. Journal of Personality Assessment, 70, 17-42.

Nelson, C. & Allen, J. (1999). Reduction of healthy children’s fears related to hospitalization and medical procedures: The effectiveness of multimedia computer instruction in pediatric psychology. Children’s Health Care, 28, 1-13.

Shelton , P., Hartmann, A.M., Allen, J. (2002). Seasonal photoperiod, gender, and P300. Biological Psychology, 60, 151-171.

Allen, J. (2002). Assessment training for practice in American Indian and Alaska Native settings. Journal of Personality Assessment, 79, 216-225.

Whatley, J.P., Allen, J. & Dana, R.H. (2003). Racial Identity and the MMPI in African American male college students. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, 9, 344-352.

Allen, J. & Dana, R.H. (2004), Methodological issues in cross–cultural and multicultural Rorschach research. Journal of Personality Assessment, 82, 189-206.

Mohatt, G.V, Hazel, K.L., Allen, J., Stachelrodt, M., Hensel, C., Fath, R. (2004). Unheard Alaska : Participatory action research on sobriety with Alaska Natives. American Journal of Community Psychology, 33, 263-273.

Allen, J., LeMaster, P., & Deters, P. (2004). Mapping pathways to services: Description of local service systems for American Indian and Alaska Native children by Circles of Care. Journal of American Indian and Alaska Native Mental Health Research (Special Issue). From http://www.uchsc.edu/ai/ncaianmhr/journal/index.htm

Simmons, T. M., Novins, D., & Allen, J. R. (2004). Words have power: (Re)–defining serious emotional disturbance for American Indian and Alaska Native children and their families. Journal of American Indian and Alaska Native Mental Health Research (Special Issue). From http://www.uchsc.edu/ai/ncaianmhr/journal/index.htm

Bess, G. & Allen, J. (2004). The evaluation lifecycle: A retrospective assessment of stages and phases of the Circles of Care program. Journal of American Indian and Alaska Native Mental Health Research (Special Issue). From http://www.uchsc.edu/ai/ncaianmhr/journal/index.htm

Thurman, P. J., Allen, J., & Deters, P. (2004). The Circles of Care evaluation: Doing participatory evaluation with American Indian and Alaska Native communities. Journal of American Indian and Alaska Native Mental Health Research (Special Issue). From http://www.uchsc.edu/ai/ncaianmhr/journal/index.htm

Mohatt, G. V., Rasmus, S. M., Thomas, L. Allen^, J., Hazel^, K., & Hensel, C. (2004). “Tied Together Like a Woven Hat:” Protective Pathways to Alaska Native Sobriety, Harm Reduction, 1. From http://www.harmreductionjournal.com/content/1/1/10

Allen, J., Mohatt, G.W., Hazel, K., Rasmus, M., Thomas, L. & Lindley, S.   (2006). The tools to understand: Community as co-researcher on culture specific protective factors for Alaska Natives. Journal of Prevention and Intervention in the Community, 32, 41-59.

Allen, J. (2007). A multicultural assessment supervision model to guide research and practice. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 38, 248-258.

Doorack, J., Allen, J., Battaglia, J. (2007). Co-occurring SAD Symptomatology and schizophrenia at high Latitude: A pilot study. International Journal of Circumpolar Health, 66, 248-256.

Mohatt, G.V., Rasmus, S.M., Thomas, L., Allen, J., Hazel, K., Marlatt, G.A., The People Awakening Team. (2007). Risk, Resilience, and Natural Recovery: A Model of Recovery from Alcohol Abuse for Alaska Natives. Addiction, 103, 205–215.

Books

Dana, R. H. & Allen, J. (2008). Cultural Competency Training in a Global Society. NY: Springer

Selected Book Chapters

Allen , J. & Walsh, J.R. (2000). A construct-based approach to equivalence: Methodologies for cross-cultural and multicultural personality assessment research. In R. H. Dana, (ed.), Handbook of multicultural/cross-cultural personality assessment (pp. 63-85). Mahwah , NJ : Erlbaum

Allen , J., Vaage, A. B., & Hauff, E. (2006). Refugees and asylum seekers in societies.. In Sam, D. & Berry, J. (ed.), Cambridge Handbook of Acculturation Psychology. (pp. 198-217). London : Cambridge University Press.

Allen , J. (2006). Ethnic identity development measures: Black racial identity attitude scale. Encyclopedia of Multicultural Psychology. Thousand Oaks , CA : Sage.

Allen, J., Mohatt, G.W., Hazel, K., Rasmus, M., Thomas, L. & Lindley, S.   (2006). The tools to understand: Community as co-researcher on culture specific protective factors for Alaska Natives. In Reeb, R., (ed.), Community Action Research: Benefits to Community Members and Service Providers. Binghamton , NY : Haworth Press. (simultaneously published in Journal of Prevention and Intervention in the Community).

Mohatt, G.V., Allen, J., & Thomas, L. (2007). Drug and alcohol abuse in cross-cultural counseling. In P. B. Pedersen, J. G. Draguns, W. J. Lonner and J. E. Trimble, Counseling Across Cultures, 6e, (pp. 395-414). Thousand Oaks , CA : Sage.

Book Reviews

Allen, J. (2008). This Decision Not to Drink. A review of Bea Medicine’s ‘Drinking and Sobriety in Lakota Society.’ Wicazo Sa Review, 23, 152-154.