Michelle A. Kovacs, PhD is originally from New York State and graduated from SUNY Binghamton in 2007 with a bachelor of arts in psychology with high honors. From there, she moved down to the sunshine state in 2009, where she enrolled in the clinical psychology doctoral program at the University of South Florida (USF). Dr. Kovacs worked with Thomas Brandon, PhD as her research advisor at the Tobacco Research and Intervention Program (TRIP) at USF/Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa FL, and honed her line of research on the relationship between smoking and eating pathology.
From 2015 to 2016, Dr. Kovacs completed her clinical internship at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University Clinical Psychology Training Consortium as a psychology resident in the behavioral medicine track, where she continued working in the realm of smoking research with Beth Bock, PhD. Rotations she completed included experiences in primary care behavioral health and consultation-liaison at the Providence VA Medical Center, as well as chronic illness and sexual health at The Miriam Hospital. During this rotation, Dr. Kovacs gained experience working with individuals with HIV/AIDS at the Immunology Clinic and became interested in issues related to substance abuse among this population. She graduated from USF with a PhD in clinical psychology.
Dr. Kovacs will be staying at Brown University during the 2016-2017 academic year to complete a one-year postdoctoral fellowship in clinical psychology at the Providence VA Medical Center, in primary care.