Staff: Chloe O. Huelsnitz, PhD, MPH

Chloe O. Huelsnitz, PhD, MPH

Organization:

• Office of the Associate Director (OAD)
• Behavioral Research Program (BRP)

Contact:
chloe.huelsnitz@nih.gov
240-276-7222

Chloe Huelsnitz, PhD, MPH, is a Cancer Prevention Fellow (CPF) in the Office of the Associate Director of the Behavioral Research Program.

Dr. Huelsnitz's scientific interests include understanding how close relationships (e.g., friends, family, romantic partners) affect individuals' engagement in cancer prevention behaviors (e.g., diet, physical activity, vaccination, sleep). Dr. Huelsnitz is especially interested in understanding the ways in which relationship partners intentionally and unintentionally affect each other's health beliefs and behaviors in ways that can be helpful or harmful to the relationship. Her previous work has focused on building theoretical and empirical understanding of the different paths of influence between partners; for instance, partners can serve as behavioral models, they can cultivate a supportive interpersonal environment within which a partner can manage their health behavior, and they can use strategies designed to influence their partner's behavior.

Additionally, Dr. Huelsnitz is interested in understanding how individuals' health beliefs and risk perceptions affect their health-related decision-making across different behavioral domains, such as dietary behavior, exercise, vaccination, receipt of genetic testing results, sun safety behaviors, and alcohol use. Dr. Huelsnitz is also interested in using mixed methods for social/behavioral science research.

Dr. Huelsnitz received her PhD in Social Psychology from the University of Minnesota (minor: Interpersonal Relationships) and her MPH in Maternal and Child Health from the University of Minnesota (minor: Epidemiology).

Current and/or past BRP mentors include William Klein.

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Scientific Interests

• Social Relationships
• Risk Perception and Risk Communication
• Dyadic Processes
• Health Beliefs and Health Behavior

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Selected Publications and Presentations

• Rising CJ, Huelsnitz CO, Shepherd RF, Klein WMP, Sleight AG, Wilsnack C, Boyd P, Feldman AE, Khincha PP, Werner-Lin A. Diet and physical activity behaviors: how are they related to illness perceptions, coping, and health-related quality of life in young people with hereditary cancer syndromes? J Behav Med 2024 Apr 20.
• Werner-Lin A, Shepherd RF, Rising CJ, Thompson AS, Huelsnitz C, Wilsnack C, Boyd P, Sleight AG, Hutson S, Khincha PP How do young people with a hereditary cancer predisposition syndrome understand and experience cancer survivorship? Psychooncology 2022 Dec 13.
• Huelsnitz CO, Turbitt E, Taber JM, Lewis KL, Biesecker LG, Biesecker BB, Klein WMP. Dyadic concordance and associations of beliefs with intentions to learn carrier results from genomic sequencing. J Behav Med 2021 May 13.
• Rothman AJ, Simpson JA, Huelsnitz CO, Jones RE, Scholz U. Integrating intrapersonal and interpersonal processes: a key step in advancing the science of behavior change. Health Psychol Rev 2020 Mar; 14(1):182-187.
• Huelsnitz CO, Simpson JA, Rothman AJ, & Englund MM. The interplay between relationship effectiveness, life stress, and sleep: A prospective study. Personal Relationships 2019 26:73-92.

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