| Biography
Marya Gwadz is Associate Dean for Research, Professor, and Director of the Intervention Innovations Team Lab (IIT-Lab) at NYU Silver. She also serves as an Associate Director in the Transdisciplinary Research Methods Core in the NIDA-funded Center for Drug Use and HIV Research (CDUHR) at NYU School of Global Public Health.
The main focus of Dr. Gwadz’s research is the development and evaluation of potent, innovative, and culturally salient social/behavioral interventions to address racial/ethnic, socioeconomic, and gender inequity in health. Her work with vulnerable adolescent and adult populations spans three decades and focuses on populations such as persons with substance use problems, sexual and gender minorities, heterosexuals in high-risk contexts, populations with high rates of criminal justice involvement, runaway/homeless youth, and people of color living with HIV from low socioeconomic status backgrounds. Dr. Gwadz’s program of research has been continually funded by the NIH since 2000.
Dr. Gwadz is an expert on the multiphase optimization strategy (MOST), a framework for developing efficient and cost-effective interventions with no inactive, poorly performing, or counter-productive elements. She is currently Co-Principal Investigator on a NIDA-funded study using MOST to optimize an intervention for vulnerable populations living with HIV (R01DA040480) with Dr. Linda Collins, the original developer of MOST. Their study is the first application of the MOST framework in the field of HIV treatment and prevention. She is also an expert on adaptive trial designs, including sequential multiple assignment randomized trials (SMART).
Prior to joining NYU Silver, Dr. Gwadz was a Senior Research Scientist at NYU Rory Meyers College of Nursing, and Director of CUDHR’s Transdisciplinary Research Methods Core. She has played a leadership role in CDUHR since 2005.
A licensed clinical psychologist, Dr. Gwadz earned her PhD and MA in clinical psychology from NYU and her BA in psychology from the University of Rochester.
| Selected Publications
Wilton, L., Gwadz, M., et al. (2025). Understanding African American/Black and Latine young and emerging adults living with HIV: A sequential explanatory mixed methods study focused on self-regulatory resources. International Journal for Equity in Health, 24(1):120. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12939-025-02492-5. PMCID: PMC12051309
Gwadz, M., Robinson, J. A., Gonzalez Blanco Serrano, F., Campos, S., Freeman, R., Chero, R., Cleland, C. M., Parameswaran, L., Hawkins, R. L., Filippone, P., Lizardo, M., Bangser, G., Ramirez, P. G., Negret, A., Kagzi, M., & Lissinna, H. (2025). Perspectives on COVID-19 vaccination among unvaccinated and under-vaccinated African American/Black and Latino frontline essential workers: A qualitative exploration. AIDS and Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10461-025-04708-9. PMCID: PMC12228974
Gwadz, M., Heng, S., Cleland C. M., Strayhorn, J. et al. (2025). Effects of behavioral intervention components to increase COVID-19 testing for African American/Black and Latino frontline essential workers not up-to-date on COVID-19 vaccination: Results of an optimization randomized controlled trial. Journal of Behavioral Medicine. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10865-025-00566-x. PMCID: in process
Gwadz, M., Wilton, L., Cleland, C. M., Serrano, S., Sherpa, D., Zaldivar, M.F., Freeman, R., Campos, S., Beharie, N., Rosmarin-DeStefano, C., Filippone, P., & Munson, M. R. (2025). A mixed methods descriptive study of a diverse cohort of African American/Black and Latine young and emerging adults living with HIV: Sociodemographic, background, and contextual factors. BMC Public Health, 25:620. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-025-21869-3. PMCID: PMC11829469
Feelemyer, J. P., Braithwaite, R. S., Zhou, Q., Cleland, C. M., Manandhar-Sasaki, P., Wilton, L., Ritchie, A., Collins, L., & Gwadz, M. (2024). Empirical development of a behavioral intervention for African American/Black and Latino persons with unsuppressed HIV viral load levels: An application of the multiphase optimization strategy (MOST) using cost-effectiveness as an optimization objective. AIDS and Behavior, 28(7):2378-90. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10461-024-04335-w. PMCID: PMC11415978
Filippone, P., Serrano, S., Campos, S., Freeman, R., Cluesman, S. R., Israel, K., Amos, B., Cleland, C. M., & Gwadz, M. (2023). Understanding why racial/ethnic inequities along the HIV care continuum persist in the United States: A qualitative exploration of systemic barriers from the perspectives of African American/Black and Latino persons living with HIV. International Journal of Equity in Health, 22: 168. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12939-023-01992-6. PMCID: PMC10466874
Strayhorn, J., Cleland, C. M., Vanness, D. J., Wilton, L., Gwadz, M., & Collins, L. M., (2023). Using decision analysis for intervention value efficiency (DAIVE) to select optimized interventions in the multiphase optimization strategy (MOST). Health Psychology, 43(2):89-100. https://doi.org/10.1037/hea0001318. PMCID: PMC8654128
Cleland, C. M., Gwadz, M., Collins, L. M., Wilton, L., Leonard, N. R., Ritchie, A. S., Martinez. B. Y., Silverman, E., Sherpa, D., & Dorsen, C. (2023). Effects of behavioral intervention components for African American/Black and Latino persons living with HIV with non-suppressed viral load levels: Results of an optimization trial. AIDS and Behavior, 27(11):3695-712. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10461-023-04086-0. PMCID: PMC10211286
Gwadz, M., Cleland, C. M., Lizardo, M., Hawkins, R. L., et al. (2022). Using the multiphase optimization strategy (MOST) framework to optimize an intervention to increase COVID-19 testing for Black and Latino/Hispanic frontline essential workers: A study protocol. BMC Public Health, 22(1),1235. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-022-13576-0. PMCID: PMC9210062.
Gwadz, M., Cluesman, S. R., Freeman, R., Collins, L. M., Dorsen, C., Hawkins, R. L., Cleland, C. M., Wilton, L., Ritchie, A. S., Torbjornsen, K., Leonard, N. L., Martinez, B. Y., Silverman, E., Israel, K., & Kutnick, A. (2022). Advancing behavioral interventions for African American/Black and Latino persons living with HIV using a new conceptual model that integrates critical race theory, harm reduction, and self-determination theory: A qualitative exploratory study. International Journal of Equity in Health, 21(1), 97. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12939-022-01699-0. PMCID: PMC9286957
| Featured Research Project
The Heart to Heart 2 Project
As noted above, Dr. Gwadz is Co-Principal Investigator on a $5.8 million National Institute of Drug Abuse-funded study (R01DA040480) using the multiphase optimization strategy framework (MOST) to optimize an intervention for vulnerable populations living with HIV. The five-year study aims to develop a highly efficacious, efficient, scalable, and cost-effective intervention to foster engagement along the HIV care continuum for Black and Latino PLWH who rarely attend HIV primary care appointments and are not taking HIV antiretroviral therapy.
| Funded Projects
Using the multiphase optimization strategy (MOST) to optimize an intervention to increase COVID-19 testing for Black and Latino/Hispanic frontline essential workers
The National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities has awarded Dr. Marya Gwadz a two-year, $2.3 million grant to use the multiphase optimization strategy (MOST) framework to optimize an intervention to address the challenge of insufficient COVID-19 testing among Black and Latino/Hispanic (BLH) frontline essential workers (FEW). The project is a multidisciplinary research collaboration between NYU Silver, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, and Northern Manhattan Improvement Corporation (NMIC), a large community-based organization founded in 1979 that operates under a settlement house model to address the needs of vulnerable and under-served communities.
Advancing knowledge on factors that promote or impede engagement along the HIV care continuum over time: A longitudinal mixed methods study of Black and Latinx youth/emerging adults living with HIV
The National Institute on Drug Abuse has awarded Dr. Marya Gwadz and Binghamton University Professor Dr. Leo Wilton a four-year, $3.1 million, Multiple Principal Investigator grant for “Advancing knowledge on factors that promote or impede engagement along the HIV care continuum over time: A longitudinal mixed methods study of Black and Latinx youth/emerging adults living with HIV”. The study seeks to understand specific factors that promote or impede behaviors that comprise engagement along the HIV care continuum (HCC) and how they operate and interplay over time among African American/Black and Latinx (AABL) youth and emerging adults living with HIV (YEA-LWH).
Courses
PhD: Dissertation Proseminar