Michael L. Dennis, Ph.D.

Michael L. Dennis, Ph.D.
SENIOR RESEARCH PSYCHOLOGIST & DIRECTOR OF THE GLOBAL APPRAISAL OF INDIVIDUAL NEEDS (GAIN) COORDINATING CENTER, NORMAL, IL
Dr. Michael L. Dennis is a Senior Research Psychologist and the Director of the Global Appraisal of Individual Needs (GAIN) Coordinating Center at Chestnut Health Systems in Bloomington IL. He was the coordinating center principal investigator (PI) of the largest adolescent treatment experiment to date, the Cannabis Youth Treatment (CYT) study. Over the past decade he has been coordinating center director or co-PI of over a dozen other adolescent treatment experiments and grant programs funded by the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment (CSAT), National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, and the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA). Dr. Dennis is currently chair of the Society for Adolescent Substance Abuse Treatment (SASATE) and is a past chair of the Joint Meeting on Adolescent Treatment Effectiveness (JMATE). He has authored over 200 peer-reviewed journal articles, chapters, manuals, or monographs, and other kinds of technical reports, edited several special journal issues on adolescent and adult substance abuse treatment, has or is serving on multiple journal editorial boards and grant review groups.
 
Dr. Dennis is the primary developer of the GAIN -- a standardized biopsychosocial to help make clinical decisions about diagnosis, placement, and treatment planning -- that is designed as a key piece of infrastructure to bridge the gap between clinical research and moving practice towards evidenced based practice. Under his direction, the GAIN Coordinating Center has provided training and support to use it for over 500 adolescent and adult research studies, demonstration grants, states, and agencies through out the U.S., Canada and Mexico. He received his Doctorate in Psychology from Northwestern University under fellowships to improve the quality of community-based research from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), National Institute of Justice (NIJ) and Rockefeller Foundation. Dr. Dennis recently received JMATE's 2006 Award for Research to Evidenced Based Practice and a 2004 MERIT award from NIDA to extend his work on managing substance use a chronic condition.