Dr. Joshua M. Smyth

Professor

Education

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Vassar College, BA.--Cognitive Science
SUNY at Stony Brook, MA.--Psychology
SUNY at Stony Brook, Ph. D.--Health Psychology

Research Interest

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Three broadly defined areas comprise my research program: (1) What are the effects of experiencing stress or trauma on psychological and physical well-being, and under what circumstances (and to what degree) can we observe such effects? (2) Can we assess stress, affect, and health in an ecologically relevant manner that facilitates our understanding of biopsychosocial processes as they unfold in time and in context? Furthermore, how can this approach (i.e., dynamic within person data capture) allow testing of novel practical and theoretical perspectives? (3) Can psychological interventions improve health and well-being, both in healthy individuals and individuals with existing physical or psychiatric illness (with a particular research focus on theoretical and applied questions about the use of expressive writing interventions)

Representative Publications

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Smyth, J. & Arigo, D. (2009). Recent Evidence Supports Emotion Regulation Interventions for Improving Health in At-Risk and Clinical Populations. Current Opinion in Psychiatry, 22, 205–210.
 
Smyth, J., Hockemeyer, J., & Tulloch, H. (2008). Expressive writing and post-traumatic stress disorder: Effects on trauma symptoms, mood states, and cortisol reactivity. British Journal of Health Psychology, 13, 85-93.

Smyth, J., Wonderlich, S., Heron, K., Sliwinski, M., Crosby, R., Mitchell, J., & Engel, S. (2007). Daily and momentary mood and stress predict binge eating and vomiting in bulimia nervosa patients in the natural environment. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 75, 629-638.

Smyth, J. (2007). Massively multiplayer online role-playing games [MMORPGS], reported health, and social behavior. Cyberpsychology & Behavior, 10, 717-721.
 
Sliwinski, M. Smyth, J., Hofer, S., & Stawski, R. (2006). Intraindividual coupling of daily stress and cognition. Psychology and Aging, 21, 545-557.
 
Mullen, B., & Smyth, J. (2004). Immigrant suicide rates as a function of ethnophaulisms: Hate speech predicts death. Psychosomatic Medicine, 66(3), 343-348.
 
Smyth, J., & Stone, A. (2003). Ecological momentary assessment research in behavioral medicine. Journal of Happiness Studies, 4, 35-52. [Special issue on Ecological Momentary Assessment]
 
Lepore, S., & Smyth, J. (2002). The writing cure: How expressive writing promotes health and emotional well-being. American Psychological Association press: Washington, DC.
 
Smyth, J., Stone, A., Hurewitz, A., & Kaell, A. (1999). Writing about stressful events produces symptom reduction in asthmatics and rheumatoid arthritics: A randomized trial. Journal of the American Medical Association, 281, 1304-1309.
 
Smyth, J., Ockenfels, M., Porter, L., Kirschbaum, C., Hellhammer, D., & Stone, A. (1998). The association between daily stressors, mood and salivary cortisol secretion. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 23, 353-370.