About Me

Associate Professor at the University of Georgia, School of Social Work (UGA SSW), Founding Director and Principal Investigator of The HEAL-Lab

My name is Dr. Karen A. Johnson. I have over twenty years of direct practice and research experience working with low-income women and youth with high rates of incarceration, homelessness, drug use and sexual risk behaviors. My research focuses on 1) decreasing sexual risk behaviors, other co-occurring risks (intimate partner violence, common mental health disorders, etc..) among low-income, drug-using women; 2) evidence-based intervention development, adaptation, acculturation, and implementation; and 3) training and engagement of peer interventionists.

I received my Ph.D. from the Columbia University, School of Social Work and completed post-doctoral training in Global Mental Health and Implementation Science from Columbia University / New York State Psychiatric Institute in August 2018.

I currently serve as an Associate Professor in the School of Social Work at the University of Georgia. I have served as an Associate Research Scientist, a co-investigator, and led the adaptation efforts for the Empowering African-American Women on the Road to Health (E-WORTH) study (n=420), a National Institute of Drug Abuse funded study. Primary and secondary outcomes of this study is HIV/STI prevention, decreased substance-usage, and increased PrEP/PEP usage among women in community corrections. WORTH is a CDC adopted, evidence-based HIV/STI prevention intervention. I currently serve as a co-investigator and co-led the adaptation efforts for a Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration funded, multi-site study with Columbia University, Yale University, and the University of Rochester, with the WORTH intervention (n=200); primary aim of this study is to reduce sexual risk behavior and increase protective behaviors such as PrEP and PEP among women recently released from jails and prisons. I am also a New York State Office of Mental Health Policy Scholar and am in the process of implementing a qualitative study with formerly homeless women (n=30) and practitioners (N=10) in criminal justice and clinic settings.  I have expertise in intervention development and evaluation for substance-using women at risk for HIV, particularly issues of adaptation, acculturation, and implementation for African American women.