Christopher Fleming
Assistant Professor
What I Do
My research examines patterns of early adversity and risk in the social environment and how these lead to severe outcomes and disparities among youth, such as gang involvement, gun violence, and justice-system involvement. My goal is to develop effective approaches to help communities, schools, and families build protective resources and reduce risks before they lead to these outcomes. I am also interested in how we can use new quantitative analytic methods to highlight and support underexamined, vulnerable populations.
Education
BA (Sociology) – University of North Carolina at Greensboro
MSW – Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
PhD (Social Welfare, social statistics concentration) – University of Washington
Postdoctoral Fellowship – University of Oregon Prevention Science Institute
Research
My etiological research examines how early trauma and patterns of risk across the social environment can lead to long-term behavioral health disparities. I have explored the unique contributions of these risk factors to various outcomes, including delinquency, substance use, risky sexual behavior, and mental health, as well as how common risk factors can lead to multiple outcomes. I especially focus on understanding how high levels of risk inform severe outcomes among adolescents and emerging adults, particularly among those involved or likely to become involved in the justice system. Inspired by my experience as a counselor in a juvenile detention center, I see these high levels of risk as a systemic disparity and social justice issue.
This work informs my applied research. By targeting these common risk factors and building protection across the social environment, we can reduce numerous behavioral health disparities among youth, including more severe outcomes. As a prevention scientist, I concentrate on developing, implementing, and evaluating evidence-based approaches to address these risks. I have contributed to and evaluated randomized and cluster-randomized controlled trials of both universal and targeted prevention implementations in communities, families, and schools. I am particularly interested in how we can improve fidelity of our prevention implementation and have recently been examining mechanisms through which school-based universal prevention can be made more effective.
As part of my work, I use advanced quantitative methods, including complex path models, multilevel and longitudinal designs, and person-centered methods. I aim to identify patterns and trajectories of risk among underexamined populations and to ensure that we are not only developing the right prevention tools, but that we are also implementing and evaluating them effectively.
Selected Publications
Fleming, C. M., Calvert, H. G., & Turner, L. (2024). Psychological safety among K‐12 educators: Patterns over time, and associations with staff well‐being and organizational context. Psychology in the Schools, 61, 2315-2337.
Fleming, C. M., Calvert, H. G., & Turner, L. (2023). Burnout among school staff: A longitudinal analysis of leadership, connectedness, and psychological safety. School Mental Health, 15, 900-912.
Turner, L., Calvert, H. G., Fleming, C. M., Lewis, T., Siebert, C., Anderson, N., Castleton, T., Havlicak, A., McQuilkin, M. (2022). Study protocol for a cluster-randomized trial of a bundle of implementation support strategies to improve the fidelity of implementation of schoolwide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports in rural schools. Contemporary Clinical Trials Communications, 28, 100949.
Nichols, L. M., Fleming, C. M., Pedroza, J. A., O’Brien, K. M., & Tanner-Smith, E. E. (2022). Psychometric properties of the Alabama Parenting Questionnaire among adolescents with substance use disorder histories. Child and Adolescent Social Work Journal, 41, 235-248
Bishop, A. S., Nurius, P. S., Fleming, C. M., Klein, R. T., & Rousson, A. N. (2022). Youth gang membership, marginalized identities, and suicidality disparities: Intersectional implications for research and practice. Child and Adolescent Social Work Journal, 1-12.
Nichols, L. M., Pedroza, J. A., Fleming, C. M., O’Brien, K. M., & Tanner-Smith, E. E. (2021). Social-ecological predictors of opioid use among adolescents with histories of substance use disorders. Frontiers in Psychology, 12, 686414.
Fleming, C. M., & Nurius, P. S. (2020). Incarceration and adversity histories: Modeling life course pathways affecting behavioral health. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 90.
Bishop, A. S., Fleming, C. M., & Nurius, P. S. (2020). Substance use profiles among gang-involved youth: Social ecology implications for service approaches. Children and Youth Services Review, 119, 105600.