Research

The Aging Adult Fraud Research & Policy Institute conducts rigorous scientific research about the risk factors, protective factors, and consequences of elder exploitation and victimization. The population of elderly Americans is rapidly increasing and the elderly represent a vulnerable target for violent victimization, sexual victimization, and financial exploitation. As a result, the Institute seeks to use evidence-based research to develop policy and practice recommendations that are presented to local, state, and national policymakers and practitioners to reduce the risk of victimization.

The Center offers a nonpharmacological approach to pain care using transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS). Its research focuses on combined therapies, tDCS with mindfulness meditation for knee osteoarthritis pain in older adults to improve self-management of pain. Lab research aims to enhance health and independence in older adults using innovative technologies to optimize pain and symptom management.

The Center for Accessibility and Safety for an Aging Population (ASAP Center) is a multidisciplinary collaboration organized to conduct research in the primary area of transportation engineering, as well as performing educational and outreach programs. The center aims to provide safe and accessible transportation to the aging population, with support by a strong research team from various disciplines including civil engineering, urban planning, geography, psychology, and health care management. Current research projects include safety investigation of older drivers and pedestrians at roundabouts, multi-modal emergency transportation operations with a focus on an aging population and improving cutaway bus safety for older passengers.

Our mission is to promote research, discovery, education and community outreach in neuroscience and mental health. We focus on the prevention, amelioration, treatment, and repair of injuries or damage to the brain and spinal cord resulting from trauma, genetic and degenerative diseases, stroke, and other causes. Our aging-related research programs focus on development of novel means for the diagnosis and treatment of neurodegenerative diseases. The clinical research program utilizes our access to Parkinson’s disease patients and focuses not only on Parkinson’s Disease per se but also on balance disorders. Research programs in cognitive-behavioral domains are focused on implementing novel methods of intervention for distressed caregivers of older adults with disabling neurological conditions, and state of the art telehealth and family care giving initiatives. Other research programs examine the role of melatonin in sleep disorders and its relationship to cognitive decline in neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s Disease. Our basic science research programs also include a focus on temporal lobe epilepsy, and discovery of novel treatments for working memory deficits. Our plans for the future include using advanced structural and functional imaging technology to supplement and expand the clinical and basic science programs.

The overarching mission of the Center of Population Sciences for Health Empowerment (C-PSHE) is to promote health access and reduce health disparities among all populations regardless of their demographic. We accomplish this by participating in community-engaged scientific and operational research and practices and employing the principles and tools of population science. Recent research at the Center includes examining psychosocial factors that contribute to the risk of age-related cognitive impairment as measured by Cardiovascular Risk Factors, Aging, and Incidence of Dementia (CAIDE) score in a racially diverse sample of men who have sex with men living with HIV.

Claude Pepper Center aims to identify policy solutions that enhance the financial, psychological, cognitive, physical, and social wellbeing of older adults and their families in the state of Florida and beyond, and help people reach later life with the resources they need to be active and engaged members of their communities.

Claude Pepper Institute on Aging and Public Policy houses some of the nation’s premier voices on aging who, through research and policy efforts, are working to better understand and address the issues facing America’s ever-growing elderly population. The mission of the Institute is to initiate research, educate students, and provide outreach activities that address the opportunities and challenges of an aging population.

The Institute for Successful Longevity conducts research into how to live longer, stay active and be fully engaged in life. The Institute takes a multidisciplinary approach to better explore the complexities of life as an older individual. In the past, aging was seen as a problem, a condition or malady. Today, the Institute sees aging as a natural stage of life, looking at all the components of an older person’s experience as it pursues the causes of age-related cognitive and physical decline and translate those discoveries into practices and interventions that slow or halt these changes.