Dinko Kranjac

Dinko Kranjac is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of La Verne, affiliated with the Cástulo de la Rocha College of Health and Community Well-Being. He holds a PhD in Experimental Psychology from Texas Christian University and has completed postdoctoral fellowships at Columbia University Medical Center, Stanford University School of Medicine, and The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. His research focuses on the social and contextual drivers of health inequities, employing quantitative methods to analyze health disparities. Co-directing the Health in Populations and Places (HiPP) Collaborative, he examines how neighborhood contexts influence physical and psychological health outcomes. Teaching includes courses on behavioral neuroscience and learning theory. His scholarship spans epidemiology, public health, and psychoneuroimmunology, with recent work addressing obesity trends, smoking patterns, and pandemic-related health disparities. Awards and grants include Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) postdoctoral support.

Research highlights include analyzing age-period-cohort effects in cigarette smoking and pediatric obesity, as well as studying neighborhood disadvantage impacts on opioid prescriptions and academic achievement. Collaborations involve interdisciplinary teams addressing health inequities through data-driven approaches. Future work continues exploring structural determinants of health using novel quantitative frameworks.