Dr. Kristina DePue joins the Counselor Education faculty

Dr. DePue received her doctoral degree in Counselor Education from the University of Central Florida. Prior to attending UCF, Dr. DePue graduated from Vanderbilt University for both her master and bachelor degrees. Helping individuals struggling with dependence from alcohol and other drugs (AODs) has been a personal mission of Dr. DePue’s for 9 years. She has worked in many roles in treatment settings and strives to increase community awareness of recovery and substance dependence. As an academic, Dr. DePue has spent the last 5 years researching in the area of addiction and change behaviors, and the chronic nature of addiction is central in her previous and future research. Dr. DePue’s dissertation examined the relationship between the bottoming out experience, the turning point, and early recovery using structural equation modeling, which was a continuation of her master’s thesis research. Dr. DePue has a high interest in research methodology and advanced statistical procedures in the human science field. At the University of Central Florida (UCF), Dr. DePue led a multi-year study in the Community Counseling Clinic that focused on counselor development and the supervisory relationship. Dr. DePue also serves as an “ad hoc” reviewer for the Journal of Addictions and Offender Counseling and an invited reviewer for the Annual Review of Best Practices in Addictions and Offender Counseling. Dr. DePue is actively involved in both the American Counseling Association (ACA) and the International Association of Addiction and Offender Counselors (IAAOC) and has served as the IAAOC Collegiate Addiction Committee Chair for the past two years. Currently Dr. DePue is working to increase research connecting family and social systems with youth addicted to AODs, as well as working on grant proposals connecting neurobiology to both addiction counseling and lifespan developmental theory.