Environmental Impacts on Human Health

Research Signature Areas

Environmental Impacts on Human Health

Health and Well-Being for All
College of Health Strategic Plan, 2025-2030

Environments play major roles in influencing our health.

Faculty address the health effects of multiple adverse environmental exposures (e.g., noise, air and water pollution, aeroallergens, radon), climate change, and natural disasters. Others focus on the effects of the built environment on health behaviors and outcomes (e.g., asthma, cancer, cardiometabolic risk factors and diseases, food insecurity, mental health).

Collaborating across disciplines and leveraging the university’s diverse strengths, our researchers are developing prevention and resilience solutions and translating evidence-informed policies, programs, and practices to communities.

We focus on health disparities and inequities, with sensitivity to how impacts stem from and are experienced in social environments. These impacts are often more severe for those with fewer resources, particularly in communities of color and marginalized groups and in low-income settings and populations.

We integrate the expertise of faculty from multiple disciplines and fields, including public health, kinesiology, nutrition, and human development and family sciences.

Publications

Recent environmental impacts on human health publications

(This is not an exhaustive list. Visit individual faculty profiles for more extensive lists of their publications.)

2025

Oje, O., Amram, O., Hystad, P., Gebremedhin, A.H., Monsivais, P.  (2025)  Use of individual Google Location History data to identify consumer encounters with food outlets  International Journal of Health Geographics  24(1)
Sorensen, J.A., Jenkins, P., Gertz, K., Roome, A., Weil, R., Graham, J., Quinn, B., Kincl, L., Dzugan, J., McCue-Weil, L.  (2025)  Adding Insult to Injury: The Impact of Musculoskeletal Pain on Fishermen’s Sleep Patterns  Journal of Agromedicine  
Hystad, P., Hill, E.L., Larkin, A., Schrank, D., Harleman, M., Volkin, E.T., Campbell, E.J., Molitor, J., Harris, L., Ritz, B.R., Willis, M.D.  (2025)  Changes in traffic-related air pollution exposures and associations with adverse birth outcomes over 20 years in Texas  International Journal of Epidemiology  54(1)

2024

Stieb, D., Chen, L., Hystad, P., Rittmaster, R., Lavigne, E.  (2024)  Outdoor nitrogen dioxide exposure and longitudinal health status trajectory in the Canadian National Population Health Survey  Scientific Reports  14
Amram, O., Oje, O., Larkin, A., Boakye, K.A., Avery, A.R., Gebremedhin, A.H., Williams, B., Duncan, G.E., Hystad, P.  (2024)  Smartphone Google Location History: A Novel Approach to Outdoor Physical Activity Research  Journal of Physical Activity & Health  

News and stories

Recent environmental impacts on human health news and stories.