Erica Payton Foh

BRIEF BIO

PERSONAL INTRODUCTION

As a teenager, living in a small, rural town in Eastern NC, I began to notice disparities in health and access to resources in my community and wondered why these differences existed? This led me to pursue a career in public health and health education with the goal to answer this very broad question and to seek solutions. I am a life-long learner and I enjoy teaching, providing mentorship to students, and engaging in meaningful service and research. In my spare time, I enjoy, reading, traveling, spending time with close family and friends and dancing to anything with a rhythmic beat! If you catch me on campus, challenge me to a dance off and let’s see who wins!

ACADEMIC PROFILE

Dr. Erica Payton Foh is an Assistant Professor of Public Health Education at the University of North Carolina – Greensboro (UNCG). As a professor and practitioner, she has worked in many different areas in public health including: health promotion, teen tobacco prevention, and women’s and children’s health. Her overall program of research is violence prevention. Specifically, Dr. Payton Foh seeks to understand current perceptions of the causes, consequences and prevention of violence (i.e. programs, policies, and legislation) at the individual, community, and societal level. She has a series of similarly themed publications which all seek to gain a better understanding of stakeholders or decision makers, opinions about the severity of firearm violence, and the reduction strategies they support.

• Ph.D. Health Education from the University of Toledo, 2014
• M.P.H. Health Promotion/ Disease Prevention from Florida International University, 2011
• B.S. Health Education and Promotion from East Carolina University, 2007
• Certificate in Ethnic and Rural Health Disparities from East Carolina University, 2013

RESEARCH INTERESTS

• Violence Prevention
• Firearm Violence Prevention
• Health Equity and Social Justice Issues

CURRENT PROJECTS

Dr. Payton Foh’s current research agenda focuses on the prevention of firearm violence within institutions such as universities and secondary schools and community-level firearm violence among Black Americans. She is particularly interested in assessing stakeholders’ perceptions of the effectiveness of firearm violence prevention policies and other interventions. Currently, Dr.Payton Foh is conducting a cross- sectional study of North Carolina County Commissioners perceptions’ of community-level firearm violence. The purpose of this study is to collect baseline data regarding elected officials’ perceptions of firearm violence prevention policies as a method to reducing community- level firearm violence. Additionally, Dr. Payton Foh, along with her co-researcher Dr. Jocelyn Smith Lee (UNCG Department of Human Development and Family Studies) and community partner, Precious McCoy (Founder and Executive Director of Shield Mentor Program) are working on the community engaged project “Assessing the Aftermath of Community Violence in Greensboro”. The goal of this research is to identify community driven priorities concerning the aftermath of violence in the lives of Black males and Black families in GSO that can inform future research, intervention, and policy.

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

Payton, E. D., Echeverria, S. E. (in press). Incorporating Health Equity and Community Perspectives During COVID-19: Commonalities with Cardiovascular Health Equity Research. Ethnicity & Disease.

Payton, E., Eluka, N., Brown, B., & Dudley, W. (2019). Women’s perceptions of intimate partner violence in Zambia, Violence and Gender (in press).

Kelly, J., & Payton, E. (2018). A content analysis of local media framing of intimate partner violence, Violence and Gender, https://doi.org/10.1089/vio.2018.0019.

E. Payton, & Khubchandani, J., Thompson, A., & Price J.H. (2017) Parents expectations of high schools in firearm violence prevention, Journal of Community Health, 42(6):1118-1126. doi: 10.1007/s10900-017-0360-5.

Price, J.H. & Payton., E. (2017). Implicit racial bias and police use of lethal force: justifiable homicide or potential discrimination, Journal of African American Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/s12111-017-9383-3.

Price, J.H., Thompson, A., Payton, E., Johnson, J., & Brown, O. (2016). Presidents of historically Black colleges and universities perceptions and practices regarding carrying of concealed handguns on their campuses, College Student Journal, 50 (1):135-144.

Price, J.H., & Payton, E. (2016). Intimate partner firearms violence: a topic ignored in women’s health journals and the impact on health providers, Violence and Gender 3(1): 36-41.

Price, J.H., Khubchandani, J., Payton, E., Thompson, A. (2016). Reducing the risks of firearm violence in high schools: principals’ perceptions and practices, Journal of Community Health, 41: 234, doi:10.1007/s10900-015-0087-0.