Thomas Greenfield, PhD
Tom Greenfield is scientific director of PHI's Alcohol Research Group (ARG). He also directs ARG's National Alcohol Research Center, which focuses on the epidemiology of alcohol problems and is sponsored by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA).
Greenfield is a core faculty member of the clinical services research training program at the University of California at San Francisco's department of psychiatry.
His research interests include the epidemiology of alcohol use and problems, alcohol policy studies, consumer satisfaction, national alcohol surveys and consumption measurement, drinking patterns and mortality, and services research. He oversees the ARG Center's national alcohol surveys, conducted every five years.
After eight years of research and practice at Washington State University and before coming to ARG in 1991, he was associate director for research at the Marin Institute for the Prevention of Alcohol and Other Drug Problems. He has served as vice president and secretary of the Kettil Bruun Society for Social and Epidemiological Study of Alcohol. Greenfield is on the Governing Council of the American Public Health Association and serves on the Extramural Advisory Board of the NIAAA.
Greenfield earned a doctorate in clinical psychology from the University of Michigan.
Drinking Patterns & Ethnicity: Impact on Mortality Risks
This project conducts a secondary analysis of existing data to enhance understanding of patterns of alcohol consumption and the epidemiology of alcohol-related problems and mortality. Objectives include addressing risk and protective factors in the U.S. population and in white, black and Hispanic subpopulations of both genders.
Epidemiology of Alcohol Problems
The goal of this project is to explore relationships between well-characterized drinking patterns and numerous highly specific problems, as well as to look at conditions such as drug taking, disability, poverty and access to services. The Alcohol Research Group addresses emerging topics that are crucial policy concerns such as interpersonal violence and health-related harms.
Gender, Alcohol and Culture: Secondary Data Analysis
The project supports the re-analysis of GENACIS (Gender, Alcohol, and Culture: Secondary Data Analysis) data. Areas of involvement include the initial scale development tasks as well as analyses related to risk curves, societal and demographic influences, drinking contexts and informal social pressures.
Methodological Studies: Study 1
This study analyzes data from wireless and landline telephone samples in the most recent National Alcohol Survey. By 2015 the mobile-only population is projected to comprise 30 percent of US adults so it is critical to reach this group for valid results.
National Alcohol Survey Resources
The aims of this core project of the National Alcohol Research Center include conducting and managing the National Alcohol Survey (NAS) undertaken every five years, with highly similar questions over the past 30 years. The 2009-10 NAS was the 12th in the series, a dual-frame landline and cell phone survey of nearly 8,000 US adults. Currently being planned is the 13th in the series, scheduled for 2014-15. The NAS data are vital for tracking US alcohol intake patterns and problems.