(she/her)
Associate Professor
Auburn University​
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Principal Investigator
AU College Experiences Study
PreVenture in Alabama
Research projects.
PreVenture in Alabama
College Experiences (and Beyond) Study
Dr. Samek has led the AU College Experiences and Beyond Study and data collection efforts starting in 2015 and continuing today.
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The original purpose of this College Experiences Study was to evaluate risk and protective factors for alcohol use disorder onset and course in the first two years of college. Comprehensive survey data was collected from 209 first year Auburn University students (90% white, 62% female) in the 2015-2016 and 2016-2017 academic years. This cohort was subsequently followed up in the 2019-2020 academic year, in effort to identity what factors in the first year of college predicted a stable course of problematic alcohol use that potentially co-occurred with stable depressive symptoms over a period of approximately four years. Results showed personality factors related to negative affect, poor sleep, and stress were most relevant to a course of stable depressive symptoms, whereas antisocial/substance-using peer affiliation, romantic partner alcohol use, and baseline substance use was most relevant to a course of stable alcohol use disorder symptoms. Dr. Samek reported such findings support individually-tailored prevention/intervention, including screening for personality-based programs.
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In 2020, Dr. Samek reflected and interrogated her research program in conjunction with her commitment to advance anti-racism, equity, and inclusion. To extend her research on mostly white populations and to elevate the voices of BIPOC students and to better understand their experiences, Dr. Samek recruited a diverse sample of first year college students in the 2021-2022 academic year (N = 191, 69% BIPOC, 52% female, 16% LGBTQ+). Dr. Samek's goal was to better understand the potential psycho-social risk and protective factors for BIPOC mental health and potentially co-occurring problematic alcohol use based on relevant theory and recent studies. Results showed that experiences of microaggressions and poor campus climate were directly associated with internalizing symptoms (depressive, anxiety, somatic), as well as indirectly through factors related to stress, poor sleep, and academic burnout. Such results underscore the need for predominately (historically) white universities and colleges to take efforts to teach White students, staff, and faculty how to identify, disrupt, and reduce racial microaggressions in effort to promote BIPOC student mental health and improve campus climate for all.
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Dr. Samek was awarded funding for an extension of this project in 2022-2024 and 2025. We collected data from a second cohort of diverse (~80% BIPOC) first-year AU students (N = 191, 2022-2023) academic year), completed a follow-up assessment of the first year cohort (2021-2022 academic year) approximately two years later (2024), and will complete a follow-up assessment of the second cohort in 2025. We aim to further evaluate what is driving the increase in mental health symptoms for emerging adults as they transition through college. Central hypotheses include that H1) negative emotions associated with national and global traumatic events (e.g., school and mass shootings, major weather events associated with climate change, police violence, war in Europe and the Middle East, threats to democracy) represent a novel risk factor for increasing mental health symptoms in adolescents and young adults. Further, we expect H2) greater frequency and intensity of social media use this association, given the amount of time young people spend online and the integration of news into social networking apps. We look forward to studying this while accounting for known risk factors such as trait negative affect, discrimination experiences, rising academic pressure, and poor sleep. In line with a strengths-based perspective, we also aim to identify potential protective factors and the individual and community levels (e.g., mindful awareness, perceptions of campus climate/school connectedness) that offset such risk. We would like to study these hypotheses in the wider population of adolescents and young adults in the years that come. We look forward to partnering with others to explore these ideas.
As part of her Outreach efforts, Dr. Samek has recently begun efforts to implement an evidenced-based substance use prevention and mental health promotion program, PreVenture, in local communities. She is currently working with the administration in Chambers County, Alabama to offer this program to eligible adolescents and are interested in offering it to other school districts and adolescent organizations in the state.
Secondary Data Analysis
Dr. Samek works with large, publicly available data to study adolescent and young adult development. Recently, graduate student researchers Brianna Crumly and Bruno Ache Akua have analyzed data from the NIH-funded ABCD project, a large, diverse sample of adolescents from 21 cites. These students are studying ecological risk and protective factors associated with emotion regulation and impulsivity in early adolescence. Dr. Samek has also worked with secondary data from the American College Health Association to demonstrate the increase in mental health indicators (e.g., past-year diagnosis/treatment of depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation) in college students from 2016-2019 applies to male, female and non-binary students, as well as across race/ethnicity groups (Black, Hispanic or Latino/a, Asian or Pacific Islander, American Indian, Alaskan Native, Native Hawaiian, Biracial or Multiracial, BIPOC, and non-Hispanic White groups); however, results showed, there was a greater increase for LGBQ+ students compared to their heterosexual peers. Further, non-Hispanic White students had significantly greater rates of past-year diagnosis/treatment of depression and anxiety, and BIPOC students had significantly greater suicidal ideation, which did not vary across time. Students who were non-binary and LGBQ+ had greater odds of each mental health indicator examined across time. This follows other work in suggesting that we need to take steps to better serve and uplift such students.
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Dr. Samek also published several studies using data from the Minnesota Center for Twin and Family Research, in part through her graduate and post-doctoral training, and through an NIH-funded secondary data analysis project, titled "Persistence of Alcohol Use Disorders: Person and Environment Effects." Analysis of the Minnesota Twin Family Study (N = 2,769, 96% white, 52% female) showed support for complex processes of individual-social context interplay as it relates to substance use disorder onset and course from adolescence through late young adulthood. She is grateful to have received training from Dr.'s Matt McGue, Bill Iacono, Meg Keyes, Brian Hicks (post-doc), and Dr.'s Martha Rueter and Lisa Legrand (graduate school).