Åsa Norman

I have an overall focus on preventing ill-health among individuals in disadvantaged situations, through developing, assessing and implementing interventions targeting both physical and psychological outcomes. With a specific interest in preentive work that target chidlren. I currently lead projects to promote positive family factors among families affected by prison incarceration with a specific focus on promoting healthy development for children with an incarcerated parent. Within this research focus I am the project leader and PI for:

• the development and evaluation of an intervention to promote psychosocial health for children with incarcerated parents and their non-incarcerated caregiver
• systematic reviews to explore internationally evaluated interventions for children of incarcerated parents and their non-incarcerated caregivers on psychosocial outcomes. The systematic reviews, (funded by the Strategic Research Area Health Care Science (SFO-V), Karolinska Institutet/Umeå University) and are registered in PROSPOERO (child and caregiver)
• the evaluation of a parental support intervention conducted in prisons in Sweden with the aim to prevent children's poor psychosocial health and future criminality and marginalisation through increased positive parenting
  Read more about the above projects here
• I am also the PI for an evaluation of a support strucutre for chidlren as young a´carers (ages 3-6 years) “BRA-samtal”, funded by Allmänna Barnhuset. 

I collaborate on reserach projects that focus on:

• evaluting the effects and feasibility of treatment for sexual offending (STOPPA) at Karolinska Institutet (PI Niklas Långström)
• investigating how social emotional competencies and well-being change across development (PATHS) at Stockholm University (PI Laura Ferrer Wreder)
• developpeing and evaluating support through a randomized controlled study of stepwise care for aggressive, oppositional behaviors among youth: New technology for improved scalability and efficacy of treatments (PI Pia Enebrink)
• implmenting and promoting of physical activity in secondary school contexts at The Swedish School of Sport and Health Sciences, GIH (PI Håkan Larsson)
• supporting physical activity in prediabetes and type 2 diabetes (Sophia Step Study) at Sophiahemmet University (PI Maria Hagströmmer, Unn-Britt Johansson)
• Implementing the parental support intervention "A Healty School Start" in the project “IMplementation and evaluation of the school-based family support PRogram a Healthy School Start to promote child health and prevent OVErweight and obesity (IMPROVE)” at Karolinska Institutet (PI Liselotte Schäfer Elinder)

Previous projects include three waves of evaluation of a school-based parental support intervention aimed to promote children’s healthy dietary and physical activity behaviours and to prevent child obesity in disadvantaged areas, the Healthy School Start intervention. The implementation of the Healthy School Start Intervention is currently being evaluated in an implementation trial: “IMplementation and evaluation of the school-based family support PRogram a Healthy School Start to promote child health and prevent OVErweight and obesity (IMPROVE)”. These trials intervention is carried out by the research group Community Nutrition and Physical Activity at the Department of Global Public Health. I mainly work with disadvantaged families and use both quantitative and qualitative methods

My research interests also involve behaviour change, motivational interviewing, and development of theory related to prevention and cultural
adaptation of evidenced-based practices. I am also interested in methodological advancements and I am currently devoted to applying and developeing advanced mixed methods appraches in internvetion and implementation reserach.

I teach on various levels and in various programs and courses at KI and supervise on master's and PhD level. I am the course leader of an introductory course in scientific methods (in Swedish) and give seminars on PhD-level in mixed-methods. Additional teaching focuses mainly on research methods (Mixed-methods, and qualitative methods), developmental psychology, behaviour change and motivational interviewing, and intervention and implementation research.
I have also been the course leader for an introductory course in developemntal psychology and on intervention and implementation research in community based work at Stockholm University.