Faculty – Department of Human Ecology

Cara L. Cuite, Ph.D.

Associate Extension Specialist/Associate Professor Undergraduate Program Director
Research Interests:
Public perceptions of food risks; communication about foodborne illness; emergency preparedness among vulnerable populations; food access and the homebound elderly.

William K. Hallman, Ph.D.

Distinguished Professor
Research Interests:
Risk perception and risk communication, public policy related to food safety, food security, and public perceptions of controversial issues concerning food, technology, health, and the environment.

Jack L. Harris, Ph.D.

Assistant Teaching Professor
Director of Undergraduate Sustainability Minor
Research Interests:
Social and organizational infrastructure and its relationship to economic and social well-being, disaster recovery and social impact networks, community energy projects in Scotland, public policy and institutional messages in shaping hyperlocal organizing and community networks.

Pamela McElwee, Ph.D.

Professor
Research Interests:
Climate change, biodiversity, ecosystem services, Asia, science-policy assessments, environmental governance.

Mary Nucci, Ph.D.

Associate Teaching Professor, Assistant Dean of Campus Engagement
Research Interests:
Science in the mass media; visual science; culture and science; rhetoric of science, informal science education, museums and science centers.

Cymie Payne, J.D.

Associate Professor
Research Interests:
Governance of natural resources and the environment through international, regional, national and local law.

Victoria Ramenzoni, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor
Research Interests:
Human behavioral ecology, coastal communities, and marine and coastal policies.

Ethan D. Schoolman, Ph.D.

Associate Professor
Research Interests:
Local and regional food systems; environmental justice and food sovereignty; ethical consumption; social movements; interdisciplinarity; sustainability in higher education.

Meryl Shriver-Rice, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor

Research Interests:
Ethnobiology; Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR); anthropological approaches to environmental restoration; Decolonial re-storying; Historical ecology; Indigenous futures; Local Ecological Knowledge (LEK); Coastal heritage at risk from climate change; Applied ethics in interdisciplinary environmental social science methods

Rachael Shwom, Ph.D.

Professor
Chair
Director of Human Dimensions of Environmental Change Graduate Certificate
Research Interests:
Energy systems transformation, politics of energy and climate change, organizational and business responses to climate change, public opinion.

Visting Faculty

Melanie McDermott

Assistant Research Professor

Faculty Emeriti

Karen M. O’Neill, Ph.D.

Associate Professor Emerita
Research Interests:
Environmental restoration policy, watershed management, local land development policies, flood control, state building and private interests, policy history.

Daniel Van Abs, Ph.D.

Professor of Practice Emeritus
Research Interests: Water resource management, water security

Peter Guarnaccia, Ph.D.

Professor Emeritus
Research Interests:
Cultural analyses of psychiatric epidemiology; the integration of cultural syndromes into psychiatric epidemiology and clinical research; cultural competence in mental health services research; processes of culture change among immigrants.

Baruch Boxer, Ph.D.

Professor Emeritus
Research Interests:
China, water resources, dam projects.

Caron Chess, Ph.D.

Professor Emerita
Research Interests:
Public participation; risk communication; undergraduate education.

Dr. George F. Clark

Professor Emeritus of Human Ecology

Jill Lipoti, Ph.D.

Assistant Teaching Professor Emerita
Research Interests:
Inculcating sustainability into the Rutgers experience for undergraduates, investigating the gamification of sustainability actions. Investigating the effect of the arts on the culture of sustainability. Improving planning for recovery from large scale nuclear or radiological incidents.