professional portrait

Syracuse University Falk College Public Health
435C White Hall
Syracuse, New York  13244

315-443-5430
bjhruska@syr.edu

CV  (PDF)

Bryce Hruska

Ph.D.
Assistant Professor

Bryce Hruska is an assistant professor in the Falk College Department of Public Health where he has served as a research assistant professor, postdoctoral researcher, and project manager for the public health program. He was previously a postdoctoral fellow at the Vermont Center on Behavior and Health. Hruska’s research focuses on better understanding how psychological stress “gets under the skin” to impact physical health. Since coming to Falk College, his work has primarily consisted of overseeing the operations of two research projects: “Environmental Toxicants, Race, and Cardiovascular Disease Risk in Children” and “The Psychosocial and Physiological Consequences of Taking and Not Taking Time Off from Work.” He has most recently published in the Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, Headache: The Journal of Head and Face Pain, as well as Environmental Research, Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, and Social Science and Medicine, among others. He has published book chapters in the Handbook of Cardiovascular Behavioral Medicine and in Trauma and Substance Abuse: Causes, Consequences, and Treatment of Comorbid Disorders, Second Edition. Hruska has presented his research at conferences including the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, the American Psychosomatic Society, and the College on Problems of Drug Dependence. He has made multiple media appearances promoting the research that he and his collaborators are performing, and he serves as an invited reviewer for a number of peer-reviewed journals including the Journal of Traumatic Stress, Journal of Anxiety Disorders, Stress and Health, Addictive Behaviors, and Journal of Psychoactive Drugs. Hruska earned an M.A. and Ph.D. in experimental psychology, with concentrations in health psychology and quantitative methods, both from Kent State University.

Education

Ph.D. Experimental Psychology, Kent State University, Kent, Ohio, 2014

M.A. Experimental Psychology, Kent State University, Kent, Ohio, 2011

B.A. Psychology, The University of Akron, Akron, Ohio, 2007

Specialization

Traumatic events, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), stress and health, occupational stress, recovery experiences, quantitative methods.

Research Focus

  • Identifying mental health risk and protective factors in high-risk occupations (e.g., the emergency medical services)
  • Developing mental health promotion and prevention strategies for implementation among high-risk occupations.
  • Using secondary data analyses to evaluate PTSD symptom heterogeneity, identify higher-order risk factors, and determine the depth and breadth of functional impairment.

Statistical Expertise

Regression-based techniques; multi-level modeling (linear and generalized linear mixed models); mediation and moderation; daily data collection designs; Stata, SPSS, R software packages.

Recent Publications

  • Hruska, B., & Barduhn, M. S. (2020). Dynamic Psychosocial Risk and Protective Factors Associated with Mental Health in Emergency Medical Service (EMS) Personnel. Journal of Affective Disorders.
  • Castro, I. E., Hruska, B., & Gump, B. B. (2020). Race Differences in the Effect of Subjective Social Status on Hostility and Depressive Symptoms Among 9-to 11-Year-Old Children. Journal of racial and ethnic health disparities, 7(5), 844-853.
  • Gump, B. B., Hruska, B., Pressman, S. D., Park, A., & Bendinskas, K. G. (2020). Vacation’s lingering benefits, but only for those with low stress jobs. Psychology & Health, 1-18.
  • Hruska, B., Pressman, S. D., Bendinskas, K., & Gump, B. B. (2020). Do vacations alter the connection between stress and cardiovascular activity? The effects of a planned vacation on the relationship between weekly stress and ambulatory heart rate. Psychology & health, 35(8), 984-999.
  • Lin, H. P., Lynk, N., Moore, L. L., Cabral, H. J., Heffernan, K. S., Dumas, A. K., ... & Spartano, N. L. (2020). A pragmatic approach to the comparison of wrist-based cutpoints of physical activity intensity for the MotionWatch8 accelerometer in children. PloS one, 15(6), e0234725.
  • Gump, B. B., Hruska, B., Parsons, P. J., Palmer, C. D., MacKenzie, J. A., Bendinskas, K., & Brann, L. (2020). Dietary contributions to increased background lead, mercury, and cadmium in 9–11 year old children: Accounting for racial differences. Environmental research, 185, 109308.
  • Hruska, B., Pressman, S. D., Bendinskas, K., & Gump, B. B. (2020). Vacation frequency is associated with metabolic syndrome and symptoms. Psychology & health, 35(1), 1-15.
  • Junglen, A., Hruska, B., Jensen, T., Boros, A., & Delahanty, D. L. (2019). Improving our understanding of the relationship between emotional abuse and substance use disorders: the mediating roles of negative urgency and posttraumatic stress disorder. Substance use & misuse, 54(9), 1569-1579.
  • Castro, I. E., Larsen, D. A., Hruska, B., Parsons, P. J., Palmer, C. D., & Gump, B. B. (2019). Variability in the spatial density of vacant properties contributes to background lead (Pb) exposure in children. Environmental research, 170, 463-471.
  • Anderson, R. E., Hruska, B., Boros, A. P., Richardson, C. J., & Delahanty, D. L. (2018). Patterns of co-occurring addictions, posttraumatic stress disorder, and major depressive disorder in detoxification treatment seekers: Implications for improving detoxification treatment outcomes. Journal of substance abuse treatment, 86, 45-51.
  • Pacella, M. L., Hruska, B., George, R. L., & Delahanty, D. L. (2018). The role of negative affect on headache‐related disability following traumatic physical injury. Headache: The Journal of Head and Face Pain, 58(3), 381-398.