Tess Boley Cruz Assistant Professor of Clinical in Preventive Medicine Dr. Tess Boley Cruz has been involved in research projects on health communication, diversity, and tobacco control, and in teaching and administration for the academic programs of the Keck School of Medicine at USC.
Research
Currently Cruz is Co-Principal Investigator of a State of California funded project on materials development in tobacco control. She also conducts research with Dr. Bruce Allen at Drew Medical University on psycho-social determinants of menthol smoking and quitting among African Americans.
From 1996 to 2000 Cruz was a co-investigator for the Independent Evaluation of the California Tobacco Control Program, which was conducted by a consortium of researchers from the Gallup Organization, the University of Southern California, and Stanford University. In that capacity, she directed the evaluation of the California anti-tobacco media campaign in 1998 and 2000, and the Tobacco Industry Monitoring Evaluation (TIME Project) from 1996 to 2000. From 2000 to 2004 she continued to direct the TIME Project as principal investigator.
From 1999 to 2004 Cruz was a co-investigator in the National Cancer Institute-funded Transdisciplinary Tobacco Use Research Center (TTURC) and Project Leader of a TTURC study of predictors of pro- and anti-tobacco media exposure in diverse populations in California. She has been a co-investigator of TRDRP-funded studies of acculturation and cigarette smoking in Asian Americans, in 1998 and 1999; of acculturation, media, peer and parent influence in adolescents, 1999 to 2001; and of tobacco use among American Indian adolescents, from 2003 to 2005.
Cruz was the evaluation chair of the Hispanic Latino Tobacco Education Network and Partnership from 1998 to 2007, involved in assessing the effects and building capacity for local and statewide programs providing tobacco advocacy and control in California.
Academics
Cruz is the Director of the Health Communications track of the USC Master of Public Health program, past director of the MPH program during its early years, and currently teaches courses on health promotion, public health communications, race and gender issues in public health.
Degrees
Univ Massachusetts Amherst, PHD, 1993
California State University, MPH, 1981
Stamps PL, Cruz NT. Issues in Physician Satisfaction. Ann Arbor: Health Administration Press, 1994.
Stoddard JL, Johnson CA, Sussman S, Dent C, Boley Cruz T. Tailoring tobacco advertising to minorities in Los Angeles County. Journal of Health Communication 3:137-146, 1998.
Chen X, Unger JB, Cruz TB, Johnson CA. Smoking patterns of Asian-American youth in California and their relationships with acculturation. Journal of Adolescent Health 24:321-328, 1999.
Unger JB, Cruz TB, Rohrbach LA, Ribsl KM, Baezconde-Garbanati L, Chen X, Trinidad DR, Johnson CA. English language use as a risk factor for smoking initiation among Hispanic and Asian American adolescents: Evidence for mediation by tobacco-related beliefs and social norms. Health Psychology Vol. 19(5): 403-410, 2000.
Unger JB, Cruz TB, Schuster D, Flora JA, Johnson CA. Measuring exposure to pro- and anti-tobacco marketing among adolescents: Intercorrelations among measures and associations with smoking status. Journal of Health Communication Vol. 6:11-29, June 2001.
Rohrbach LA, Howard-Pitney B, Unger JB, Dent CW, Howard KA, Cruz TB, Ribisl KM, Norman GJ, Fishbein H, Johnson CA. Independent evaluation of the California Tobacco Control Program: Relationships between program exposure and outcomes, 1996-1998. American Journal of Public Health Vol. 92, No. 6: 975-983, June 2002.
Unger JB, Shakib S, Cruz TB, Hoffman BR, Howard-Pitney B, Rohrbach LA.
Smoking behavior among urban and rural Native American adolescents in
California. American Journal of Preventive Medicine 25(3): 251-254, 2003.
Portugal C, Cruz TB, Espinoza L, Romero M, & Baezconde-Garbanati L. Countering tobacco industry sponsorship of Hispanic/Latino organizations through policy adoption. Health Promotion Practice 5(3) Supplement: 142-156S, July 2004.
Weiss JW, Cen S, Schuster D, Unger JB, Johnson CA, Moutappa M, Schriener W, Cruz TB. Longitudinal effects of pro-tobacco and anti-tobacco messages on adolescent smoking susceptibility. Nicotine and Tobacco Research, 8(3): 455-465, June 2006.
Feighery E, Schleicher N, Cruz TB, Unger JB. An examination of trends in amount and type of cigarette advertising and sales promotions in California stores, 2002-2005. Tobacco Control, 17(2): 93-98, April 2008.
Cruz TB (Contributing Author). National Cancer Institute. The Role of the Media in Promoting and Reducing Tobacco Use. Tobacco Control Monograph 19. Bethesda, MD: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute. NIH Publication Number 07-6242, June 2008. (Primary contribution: Chapter 5, Themes and Targets of Tobacco Advertising and Promotion).
Cruz TB. Monitoring the tobacco use epidemic IV. The vector: Tobacco industry data sources and recommendations for research and evaluation. Preventive Medicine, 48(1)s: S24-S34. January 2009.
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