Prevention and health promotion

Principal investigators

Univ.-Prof. Dr. med. Dipl.-Psych. Manfred E. Beutel
Univ.-Prof. Dr. Ana Nanette Tibubos
Prof. Dr. rer. biol. hum. habil. Elmar Brähler
Prof. Dr. med. Matthias Michal
Dr. rer. physiol. Anke Quack, M.A.
PD Dr. biol. hom. et med. habil. Rüdiger Zwerenz
Dr. sc. hum. Dipl.-Psych. Klaus Wölfling

Research topics

Health promotion and prevention aim at improving health on an individual and collective level. This approach complements the traditional disease-focused approach and promises to close the prevention gap that has impeded the fight against stress-related disorders. In addition to prevention and intervention targeted at individuals (behavioral prevention), systemic approaches in different life domains are equally important for the advancement of mental health to (a) reduce risk factors, and (b) increase resources that are known to promote resilience (structural and situational prevention). Current projects are the prevention of child abuse in the projects „Don’t offend" and „Sexual violence against children in families".

The holistic model „Healthy Campus Mainz - gesund studieren" is funded in the context of the prevention law (§ 20g SGB V). It aims at developing and implementing evidence-based interventions for health promotion of the about 31.000 students in Mainz and a sustainable health management for the university.

In the field of psychocardiology and stress processing we investigate the influence of psychosocial factors on the development and course of cardiovascular diseases and develop innovative concepts for psychocardiological prevention and care.

The Working Group Gamer Protection and Prevention at the Department for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy is dedicated to the conception, implementation and evaluation of measures for the prevention of gambling addiction.