Majors:
Criminology, psychology and philosophy

Project:
Analyzing Qualitative Data on Social Causes of Opioid Use Disorder

Between 1999 and 2019, more than 500,000 people died from opioid-related drug overdoses in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control. Olivia is working to better understand the social factors that may underlie opioid use disorder. For her project, she’ll analyze nearly 800 pages of data drawn from interviews of people in opioid treatment programs. She’ll look for trends and commonalities that may be helpful in piecing together the factors that may predispose people to excessive opioid use.

Faculty Mentor:
Barbara Costello, professor of sociology

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“I want to spend the summer really developing my skills as a researcher and exploring a topic that I’ve learned in depth about. It would be amazing to come away with a publishable paper and be able to share it with others in the field.” –Olivia Belitsos