Denise Saint Arnault, PhD, RN, FAAN
Founder and Director 2020-2022
Dr. Saint Arnault’s is a professor in the School of Nursing at the University of Michigan and holds degrees in Psychiatric Nursing and Medical Anthropology. Her research centers on gender, cultural and social influences on mental health, trauma recovery, and help seeking. She develops and tests help seeking and trauma recovery theory, and uses mixed methods to discover how distress experiences, culturally based meanings (such as stigma and sense of coherence), social support, and social negativity impact the help seeking journey. Her Clinical Ethnographic Narrative Interview (CENI) provides a transcultural method that allows people to explore the cultural and social influences in their search for health, and also promotes self-awareness and active engagement in the help-seeking process.
Nikoleta Ratsika, PhD
Vice Chair 2020-2022
Dr Ratsika is an assistant professor in the field of Community Social Work in the Department of Social Work, School of Health Sciences, Hellenic Mediterranean University in Crete, Greece. She has a degree in Social Work (TEI of Crete, 1981) an M. Phil. (2001) as well as a PhD (2012) in Social Work (Umeå University, Sweden). She is particularly interested in community interventions against domestic violence and familiar with qualitative social research.
Laura Sinko, PhD, RN, CCTS-I
Secretary 2020-2022
Dr. Laura Sinko is a mental health nurse and sexual assault nurse examiner by clinical training. She received her PhD from the University of Michigan and is currently a National Clinician Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Sinko’s research interests surround healing and recovery after gender-based violence and understanding socio-cultural influences of that process. Her specific area of focus is sexual violence. She has a passion for visual research methodologies and creative dissemination strategies to bridge the gap between science, practice, and the community.
Sachiko Kita, PhD, RMW, RN, PHN
Treasurer 2020-2022
Dr. Kita is an international scholar in the field of family violence, especially gender-based violence (GBV) and child abuse. Her major interests include bio-psycho-social recovery process after GBV and preventions for poly-victimization and intergenerational transmission of violence in family. Her research projects are ongoing in collaborations with international scholars, such as the U.S., Hong Kong and Norway.