Danielle Parrish
Professor, Director of Baylor IMPACT Lab

Education
PhD, School of Social Work, The University of Texas at Austin
MSW, Social Work Department, California State University
B.A. Psychology, Psychology Department, California State University
Research Interests
- Evidence-Based Practice
- Intervention & Implementation Research
- Prevention of Substance-Exposed Pregnancy
- Transtheoretical Model and Behavior Change
- Adolescent Substance Use
- Social Anxiety Disorder in Youth
- Adolescent Risk and Protective Factors
- Juvenile Justice
- Integrated Behavioral Health
- Motivational Interviewing
- Health Disparities
- Health Equity
Selected Publications
Washburn, M., Parrish, D., Oxhandler, H., Ma, A., & Garrison, B. (2021). A mixed methods investigation of Licensed Master-level social workers engagement in outcome evaluation, Research on Social Work Practice, 32:2, 186-198. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F10497315211051623
Parrish, D.E., & Thompson, R., Negi, N., & Macias, L. (2021). A National Survey of Probation Staff of the Needs, Services and Barriers of Female Youth in Juvenile Justice Settings. Women & Criminal Justice, 31, 6:445-462. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08974454.2020.1813236
Parrish, D.E. (2020). Achieving Justice for Girls in the Juvenile Justice System. Social Work (New York), 65(2), 149-158. https://doi.org/10.1093/sw/swaa005
Parrish, D.E., von Sternberg, K., Benjamins, L., Duron, J., & Velasquez, M.M. (2019). CHOICES-TEEN: Reducing Substance-Exposed Pregnancy and HIV among Juvenile Justice Females. Research on Social Work Practice, 29(6), 618-627. https://doi.org/10.1177/1049731518779717
Rubin, A., Parrish, D.E, & Miyawaki, C.E. (2019). Benchmarks for outcome evaluations of reminiscence and life review therapy for the elderly. Social Work, 64(1), 61-72. https://doi.org/10.1093/sw/swy054
Parrish, D.E. (2018). Evidence-based practice: A common definition matters. Guest Editorial. Journal on Social Work Practice. https://doi.org/10.1080/10437797.2018.1498691
Sampson, M., Parrish, D.E., & Washburn, M. (2018). Assessing MSW Students’ Integrated Behavioral Health Skills Using an Objective Structured Clinical Examination. Journal of Social Work Education. https://doi.org/10.1080/10437797.2017.1299064
Parrish, D., Duron, J., & Oxhandler, H. (2017). Adolescent recruitment strategies: Lessons learned from a university-based study of social anxiety. Social Work Research, (41)4, 213-220. https://doi.org/10.1093/swr/svx016
Velasquez, M. M., von Sternberg, K., Floyd, R. L., Parrish, D., Kowalchuk, A., Stephens, N. S., Ostermeyer, B., Green, C., Dolan-Mullen, P. (2017). Preventing Alcohol and Tobacco Exposed Pregnancies: CHOICES Plus in Primary Care. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, (53)1, 85-95. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amepre.2017.02.012
Parrish, D., von Sternberg, K., Castro, Y., & Velasquez, M. (2016). Processes of Change in Preventing Alcohol Exposed Pregnancy: A Mediation Analysis. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 84(9), 803-812. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27176661.
Parrish, D., Oxhandler, H., Duron, J., Swank, P. & Bordnick, P. (2016). Feasibility of Virtual Reality Environments for Adolescent Social Anxiety Disorder. Research on Social Work Practice, 26(7), 825-835. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1049731514568897
Parrish, D. & Oxhandler, H. (2015). Orientation of social work field instructors to evidence-based practice. Journal of Social Work Education, 51, 270-286. https://doi.org/10.1080/10437797.2015.1012943
Parrish, D. (2015). Introduction to the Special Issue: The Houston Bridging the Research-Practice Gap Symposium. Research on Social Work Practice, 25(4), 405-407. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1049731514540341
Velasquez, M.M, von Sternberg, K., Parrish, D. (2013). CHOICES: An integrated behavioral intervention to prevent Alcohol Exposed Pregnancies among high-risk women in community settings. Special Issue on the Prevention and Treatment of Substance Use Disorders. Social Work in Public Health, 28(3-4), 224-233. https://doi.org/10.1080/19371918.2013.759011
Parrish, D. & Rubin, A. (2012). Social workers’ orientation to evidence-based practice: A comparison with psychologists and LMFTs. Social Work 57(3),201-210. PMID: 23252312. https://doi.org/10.1093/sw/sws016
Parrish, D., von Sternberg, K., Velasquez, M.M., Cochran, J., Sampson, M.M., Dollan-Mullen, P. (2012). Characteristics and factors associated with the risk of a nicotine-exposed pregnancy: Expanding the CHOICES pre-conception counseling model to tobacco. Journal of Maternal and Child Health, 16, 6: 1224-1231. PMID: 21735139. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10995-011-0848-z
Parrish, D., & Rubin, A. (2011). Validation of the Evidence-Based Process Assessment Scale—Short Version. Research on Social Work Practice, 21, 200-211. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1049731510389193
Parrish, D., & Rubin, A. (2011). An Effective Model for Continuing Education Training in Evidence-Based Practice. Research on Social Work Practice, 21, 77-87. https://doi.org/10.1177/1049731509359187
Background
Dr. Danielle Parrish joined the Diana R. Garland School of Social Work in August 2018 after serving on faculty at the University of Houston for nine years. Dr. Parrish is director of the Baylor IMPACT Lab, Principal Investigator on the CHOICES-TEEN Efficacy Study (R01DA050670-01A1), and affiliated faculty with the Health Behavior Research and Training Institute at the University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Parrish began her social work career as a clinical social worker in a large public mental health system where she provided infant mental health, outpatient mental health, and juvenile justice mental health services. During this time, she was struck by the discrepancy between the growing literature demonstrating the efficacy of certain behavioral health treatments and a lack of their consistent use in practice. These practice experiences have fueled her passion to bridge the research-practice gap by: 1) teaching students to become critical consumers of practice research and skilled evaluators of their practice, and 2) developing and disseminating feasible and efficient behavioral health interventions that reduce health disparities, promote health and healthy development, and translate more seamlessly to real practice settings.
One line of Dr. Parrish’s intervention research focuses on the development and testing of prevention interventions for adult and adolescent females at risk of substance-exposed pregnancy and HIV/STIs. She has been fortunate to serve as a principal investigator and co-investigator on prevention intervention studies funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIDA and NIAAA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to reduce the risks of alcohol and drug-exposed pregnancy among women in public health clinics and adolescent females in the juvenile justice system. Dr. Parrish is particularly interested in exploring the potential benefit of brief, bundled prevention approaches that simultaneously target multiple health risks. A secondary focus of Dr. Parrish’s research focuses on the development of more efficient interventions to treat youth social anxiety disorder. In both lines of research, Dr. Parrish is particularly interested in using technology to increase efficiency and reach of these interventions. Dr. Parrish’s scholarly work also focuses on the teaching, broad dissemination and implementation of evidence-based practice in social work.
Dr. Parrish is excited to continue her collaboration with SEARCH Homeless Services as a contracted Research Scientist on several evaluation and research projects focused on improving the lives of homeless or housing insecure populations in Houston. She enjoys being connected to the local community and partnering with an agency interested in implementing and evaluating empirically supported programming.
Dr. Parrish is currently the Editor for the Journal of Social Work Education.
Dr. Parrish met her husband, Reuben Parrish, while running track at Fresno State. They have been married for 22 years and have a 16-year-old daughter, Zoe. In her free time, Dr. Parrish enjoys playing soccer, and watching Zoe dance.