DIVISION OF KINESIOLOGY AND HEALTH FACULTY RESEARCH 2009-2011 

 Tami Benham-Deal, P.E.D. (Indiana University), Associate Professor

Dr. Benham Deal's primary line of research focuses on children's and adolescents' physical activity.  Dr. Benham Deal's second line of research examines standards based physical and health education, including professional development and assessment practices.

Mark Byra, Ph.D. (University of Pittsburgh), Professor and Director

Dr. Byra's research interests revolve around the Spectrum of Teaching Styles, models of teaching, student interest and engagement in physical education, development of pre-service teacher knowledge, and the development of knowledge and skill in coaches.

Jayne M. Jenkins, Ph.D. (University of North Carolina, Greensboro), Professor

Dr. Jenkins' research interests revolve around curriculum and instruction. Investigations include pre-service teacher development (e.g., pedagogical content knowledge) particularly in terms of observation and peer coaching as well as curriculum design, development, models, and instructional models.  Additional research revolves around university conceptual physical education courses in regard to outcomes, cohesion, and exercise adherence.

Karen Lux, Ph.D., Assistant Professor

Dr. Lux's research interests involve the socio-political factors influencing the work lives of physical education teachers.  More specifically, Dr. Lux investigates the low status and marginalization of physical education as a subject matter in schools, how PE teachers navigate these obstacles in their working environment, and how teaching a low status subject impacts the nature of PE teachers' work.

Christine M. Porter, Ph.D. (Cornell University), Assistant Professor

Dr. Porter researches community food system efforts to prevent obesity and hunger and to build equitable economic development and ecological sustainability. She pursues these interests as project director of Food Dignity, a 5-year action research initiative to engage food in secure communities and universities in building sustainable food systems for food security. She is also interested in public health ethics and community-based participatory research.

She is specifically conducting research in community nutrition, health promotion and education, and community development.

Tucker Readdy, Ph.D. (Oregon State University), Assistant Professor

Dr. Readdy's research interests lie in the exercise psychology and sport sociology.  He also has research interests in the area of women's studies.

Dr. Readdy has developed a line of research centered on coach and athlete motivation within the collegiate sport context, including how coach-athlete interactions can optimize player performance through enhancing their autonomy, competency, and relatedness to others.  He is particularly interested in phenomenological interpretations of people's experiences, and uses a variety of theoretical backgrounds and research methodologies in his efforts to understand the complex nature of the college sport world.

Derek T. Smith, Ph.D. (University of Colorado, Denver), Associate Professor

Dr. Smith's current research interests and projects are centered around the cardioprotective benefits of a habitually physically active lifestyle and effective strategies to promote the adoption and maintenance of a physically activity lifestyle in youth and adults.  Three areas of current investigation include: (1) the efficacy of theory-based internet-delivered physical activity behavior change programs in sedentary and overweight adults; (2) the efficacy of a web-based physical activity tracking tool and a school community-based participatory research approach to increase physical activity levels of K-12 schoolchildren; and (3) the influence of habitual physical activity on select cardiometabolic disease risk factors -  inflammation, oxidative stress, insulin resistance and fibrinolysis.

D. Paul Thomas, Ph.D. (Temple University), Professor

Dr. Thomas' research interests relate to cardiac structure and function.  More specifically he has been interested in adaptations made by the heart to both physiological and pathological overload.  Exercise, a physiological overload, places tremendous stress on the heart, and his laboratory has been studying acute effects and chronic adaptations that the left ventricle makes to these stresses both in terms of cellular (myocyte) and intracellular adaptations as well as the vasculature, microvasculature, and extracellular space.   In collaboration with Drs. Richard McCormick and Mark Stayton in the Departments of Animal Science and Molecular Biology, respectively, Dr. Thomas has been studying both pre- and post-translational modifications in the heart induced by aging, exercise, and myocardial infarction.

Tristan Wallhead, Ph.D. (The Ohio State University), Associate Professor

Dr. Wallhead's research interests include (1) examining the efficacy of sport-based curricular models such as Sport Education and Teaching Games for Understanding in facilitating student learning, and the role of physical education curricular models in promoting extra-curricular youth physical activity.

Dr. Wallhead's main research interest is sport-based physical education curricular models.  He is interested in examining student learning and physical activity participation in the Sport Education Model and the Tactical Games Approach.

Qin (Arthur) Zhu, Ph.D. (Indiana University), Assistant Professor

 Dr. Zhu's area of expertise is motor learning and motor control.  His research focuses on the coupling of perceptual and motor learning, especially how learning could occur during the crosstalk between perception and action. He is also interested in the control of motor skill in which the maximum efficiency could be explored with the consideration of physical law and the environmental factors