A&S Researcher of the Month: Michael Nadorff



Michael Nadorff


The College of Arts and Sciences at Mississippi State has named Michael Nadorff Researcher of the Month for November.

An assistant professor of psychology, where he also serves as the director of clinical training for the department’s clinical psychology Ph.D. program, Nadorff received a B.A. in psychology and computer applications from the University of Notre Dame, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in psychology from West Virginia University. Prior to joining the faculty at Mississippi State in 2012, he completed his clinical internship at the Baylor College of Medicine.

Nadorff is the primary investigator of a SAMHSA Garrett Lee Smith Suicide Prevention Grant that funds the MSU Connection Suicide Prevention Program, which he co-directs. He also is a co-investigator on an R15 grant examining people with wide-ranging symptoms and their responses to computerized tasks.

Nadorff’s research examines the relation between sleep difficulties and suicidal behavior. His past research, published in the journal SLEEP, found that having nightmares was associated with greater risk of suicide after accounting for the effects of depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress disorder. More recently, he and his research team have found that the length of time that one has had a sleep disorder is more strongly associated with suicide than an individual’s current symptoms, and that a substantial proportion of alcohol’s impact on suicidal behavior can be explained by insomnia symptoms.

Based upon these findings, Nadorff is planning studies examining whether sleep interventions may reduce suicide risk. It is his hope that these studies may improve the way that suicide risk is treated, and in turn, reduce the number of lives that are lost to suicide.

Editor's note: The Arts & Sciences Researcher of the Month is provided by the College of Arts and Sciences at MSU. For additional information, please see www.cas.msstate.edu/research or contact Karyn Brown at kbrown@deanas.msstate.edu or 662-325-7952.

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