Yessenia Castro, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor

Yessenia Castro, Ph.D., earned her doctoral degree in clinical psychology from The Florida State University in 2008. She completed a postdoctoral training program at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in 2010 that focused on disparities-related research among minority and underserved populations, with an emphasis on smoking cessation among Latinos. She is an Assistant Professor in the School of Social Work at the University of Texas at Austin, where she studies the influence of cultural adaptation variables on cancer risk behavior among Latinos. She is particularly interested in understanding how cultural variables combine with known key determinants of smoking to affect cessation outcomes. Her work also incorporates understanding determinants of multiple cancer risk behaviors among Latinos, and she collaborates on research examining social determinants of smoking cessation among individuals of low socioeconomic status and other special populations of smokers.

Curriculum Vitae (PDF)

Professional Interests

Development, evaluation, and dissemination of interventions for health risk behaviors; effects of cultural factors, gender, and race/ethnicity on health behavior; Latino health; psychometrics.

Education

• Ph.D., The Florida State University
• M.S., The Florida State University
• B.A., University of Southern California

Teaching History

Faculty Research

• Developing a Culturally Relevant Model of Smoking Cessation among Latinos (2016)