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image of Leslie Leve, PhD

More About Our Director:

Leslie Leve, PhD, Lorry Lokey Chair in Education, Professor, and Department Head, Counseling Psychology and Human Services, College of Education; Scientist, Prevention Science Institute
Email: leve@uoregon.edu 
Phone: 541-346-9528 
Academic Office: 368 HEDCO Education Building 
Research Office: 1600 Millrace Dr., Suite 109 

Research Gate

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Leslie Leve, PhD, is the Lorry Lokey Chair in the College of Education and a “double duck,” receiving her masters and doctorate at the University of Oregon in the ‘90s in the College of Arts and Sciences and returning to the university in 2013 as a professor in the College of Education.

Professor Leve is best known for her research on child and adolescent development, gene-environment interplay, and interventions for underserved children, families, and communities. This includes preventive intervention studies with youth in foster care or juvenile justice system, adoption studies that examine the interplay between biological and social influences on development, and COVID-19 testing outreach programs for Latinx communities. She co-directs a center on parenting in the context of opioid use. Her work also focuses on outcomes for girls and women. To date, she has published more than 190 scientific articles and 20 book chapters. Her research has been funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health, the National Institute of Justice, and the U.S. Department of Education.

In 2021, she received the Outstanding Researcher Award from the UO, and in 2017 she received its faculty Excellence Award. Professor Leve is currently focusing her research on: (1) promoting healthy outcomes for women with substance use histories; (2) utilizing genetic data to refine the understanding of how one’s family and contextual environment can promote healthy outcomes for children and adolescents; (3) examining the adult outcomes of juvenile justice involvement; and (4) delivering COVID-19 testing and health interventions to Latinx communities in Oregon.

She collaborates with local, national, and international colleagues to conduct this research, including colleagues at the University of Oregon (Drs. Beth Stormshak, Bill Cresko, Brendan Bohannan, Camille Cioffi, Maria Schweer-Collins, Nichole Kelly), and external colleagues at Penn State (Dr. Jenae Neiderhiser), George Washington University (Dr. Jody Ganiban), the University of California, Riverside (Dr. Misaki Natsuaki), and the University of Cambridge (Dr. Gordon Harold), as well as numerous students, postdocs, and research associates.

Professor Leve typically takes one new doctoral student, three masters students, and three undergraduate students each year and strongly encourages applications from students from diverse backgrounds.


Science Knight Out: "The Nature of Nurture" | Leslie Leve at Science Knight Out, April 1, 2021

Adopted children’s genetic makeup affects how they are parented: Adopted children’s genetic characteristics can influence the parenting they receive, according to new research. 

Connections and the Foster Care System In an episode of Adaptivity, the podcast on the science of adolescence, they talked with Sixto Cancel and Dr. Leslie Leve, both experts on youth in child welfare system, about what that system could look like if it reflected what is known about developmental science. 

Your Direction: iHeart Podcast: In this episode Tony and Pat interview Dr. Leslie Leve, and the discussion focuses on purpose and youth mental health. Dr. Leve is the Lorry Lokey Chair in the College of Education at the University of Oregon, and studies child and adolescent development, gene-environment interplay, and interventions for underserved children, families, and communities. We hope you enjoy this episode!

Forging Strong Relationships: Women Leading Prevention Science: In episode #4, Sara Hairgrove interviews Dr. Leslie Leve, Lorry Lokey Chair and professor in the College of Education and scientist at the Prevention Science Institute at the University of Oregon, and Dr. Beth Stormshak, Philip H. Knight Chair and professor in the College of Education and a research scientist at the Prevention Science Institute at the University of Oregon.