David Creswell

William S. Dietrich II Professor in Psychology and Neuroscience
CEO, Equa Health

Areas of Expertise

Health Psychology, Health Neuroscience, Psychoneuroimmunology, Social Psychology, Clinical Psychology

Bio

David’s research focuses broadly on understanding what makes people resilient under stress. Specifically, he conducts community intervention studies, laboratory studies of stress and coping, and neuroimaging studies to understand how various stress management strategies alter coping and stress resilience. For example, he is currently working on studies that test how mindfulness meditation training impacts the brain, peripheral stress physiological responses, and stress-related disease outcomes in at-risk community samples. David also explores how the use of simple strategies (self-affirmation, rewarding activities, cognitive reappraisal) can buffer stress and improve problem-solving under pressure.

David has made some recent research forays into other areas, such as in describing the role of unconscious processes in learning and decision making, developing new theory and research on behavioral priming, and in building a new field of health neuroscience.

Education

• B.A. Psychology, Colorado College

• Ph.D. in Psychology, UCLA

Research

Dr. Creswell’s current research projects can be found on the Health and Human Performance Lab website.

Publications

Google Scholar Profile

Creswell, J.D. (2017). Mindfulness Interventions. Annual Review of Psychology, 68, 491-516.

Dutcher, J.M. & Creswell, J.D. (2018). The role of brain reward pathways in stress resilience and health. Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, 95, 559-567.

Lindsay, E.K., Young, S., Brown, K.W., Smyth, J., & Creswell, J.D. (2019). Mindfulness training reduces loneliness and increases social contact in a randomized controlled trial. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116, 3488-3493.

Creswell, J.D., Villalba, D., Chin, B., & Lindsay, E.K. (2019). Mindfulness interventions for physical health: mechanisms and outcomes. Psychosomatic Medicine, 81, 224-232.

Lindsay, E.M., Creswell, J.D., Stern, H.J., Greco, C.M., Walko, T.D., Dutcher, J.D., Wright, A.G.C., Brown, K.W., & Marsland, A.L. (2022). Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction increases stimulated IL-6 production among lonely older adults: A randomized controlled trial. Brain, Behavior, & Immunity, 104, 6-15.

Dutcher, J.M., Lederman, J., Jain, M., Price, S., Kumar, A., Villalba, D.K., Tumminia, M.J., Doryab, A., Creswell, K.G., Mankoff, J., Cohen, S., Dey, A., & Creswell, J.D. (in press). Lack of belonging predicts depressive symptomatology in college students. Psychological Science.

Current Course Offerings

• Research Methods in Social Psychology
• Hack Your Life
• Graduate Core Class in Social and Health Psychology