Dr. Jahns joined the Grand Forks Human Nutrition Research Center in January, 2009. She came to Grand Forks from Knoxville, TN, where she was an Assistant Professor of Public Health Nutrition in the Department of Nutrition. Dr. Jahns completed a B.S. degree in Dietetics at Texas Christian University, Ft. Worth, TX, in 1998 and a Ph.D. degree (Nutritional Epidemiology; minor: Epidemiology) at The University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC, in 2004.
Dr. Jahns' research focuses on identifying behavioral, physiological, dietary, and biological causes and mediators of unhealthy eating behavior, inactivity, and unhealthy body weight in the American public, and to identify effective ways to facilitate and promote behavior changes in individuals and groups to meet dietary and physical activity recommendations for health.
Current projects focus on diet-related aspects of overweight and chronic disease prevention and health promotion. Specifically, 1) the characterization of eating behaviors (meal frequency and patterning, snacking, specific foods or nutrients) that are associated with health risks, and 2) how individual, psychosocial, and biological susceptibility interacts with the environment (such as socioeconomic context) to contribute to ill health.