Marguerita Lightfoot, PhD

Marguerita Lightfoot, PhD, is Professor of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine, Chief for the Division of Prevention Science, Director of the Center for AIDS Prevention Studies (CAPS), Director of the UCSF Prevention Research Center and she holds the Walter Gray Endowed Chair. Her research focus has been improving the health and well-being of adolescents and young adults as well as the development of efficacious interventions to reduce acquisition and transmission of HIV among those populations disproportionately burdened by the epidemic. Her domestic and international research has included developing interventions for runaway/homeless youth, juvenile justice involved adolescents, youth in medical clinics and settings, youth with a parent living with HIV, and youth living with HIV, among others. She is particularly interested in developing cost-effective interventions that are easily translatable with utility in community settings and utilizes new technologies to engage disenfranchised individuals in health promotion activities.  She has extensive experience training and mentoring students, fellows, trainees, and early-career faculty across a number of disciplines. She also currently serves as a standing review committee member for a NIH review panel, on the editorial boards of American Psychologist and Cultural Diversity & Ethnic Minority Psychology, and was recently associate editor for the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology.