Co-Director

Velma McBride Murry, Ph.D., is a Professor of Child and Family Development and Co-Director of the Center for Family Research at the University of Georgia. She received her doctorate in Human Development and Family Relations from the University of Missouri-Columbia in 1988. She currently serves on the National Institute of Health Center for Scientific Grant Review Panel (the Risk, Prevention and Health Behavior Integrated Review Group). Her work has been supported by funding from the National Institutes of Mental Health, the National Institute of Drug and Alcohol Abuse, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Dr. Murry has made significant contributions to our understanding of the significance of context in studies of African-American families and youth. Her investigation of the impact of racism on family functioning has elucidated the dynamics of this contextual stressor in the everyday life of African Americans. Her research on the ways in which family members buffer each other from the impact of the external stressors that cascade through African-American lives was one important stimulus for her subsequent focus on family intervention as a potential protection against the development of risky adolescent behavior. Through longitudinal studies of rural African-American children, Murry and her colleague Brody identified many protective factors, ranging from personality characteristics and coping behaviors to dynamic contextual interactions among personality dispositions, social support and family processes. The results of this research support her premise that individual and family attributes can ameliorate the impact of multiple risk factors on children and adolescents. These two areas of research have informed the development of the Strong African American Families (SAAF) intervention program that targets the prevention of early onset sexual behavior and substance abuse. Currently, Dr. Murry’s work focuses on the implementation and dissemination of this preventive intervention for African-American youth and their families. She can be reached at vmurry@uga.edu.