Rick Macatee

The Biobehavioral Research on Addiction and INternalizing Syndromes (BRAINS) Lab uses a translational biobehavioral research framework to understand the etiology and treatment of co-occurring mood/anxiety and substance use disorders, with a particular emphasis on Cannabis Use Disorder. To accomplish our ultimate aim of reducing the suffering and public health burden associated with these disorders, our lab focuses on the following two objectives: risk assessment and intervention development. Our first objective is to use experimental manipulations in the lab (e.g., psychological/pharmacological stress inductions) to characterize theoretical psychopathological mechanisms across multiple units of analysis (e.g., EEG/ERP, peripheral psychophysiology, behavior, self-report), with a strong emphasis on the development of reliable measures that can serve as possible treatment targets and/or clinically useful predictors (e.g., of disorder risk/course, treatment response). Our second objective is to develop and evaluate novel, mechanism-targeted treatments (behavioral [especially digital], neurostimulation) within a precision medicine framework, with a strong emphasis on cost-effective and scalable digital interventions (e.g., computerized/smartphone-delivered, integration with wearables).