Dalla Lana School of Public Health

Faculty Member

Michael Goodstadt B.A; Ph.D. (Psychology)

Research Interests

• Currently: Most recently, my attention has inevitably turned to the complex issues related to aging, including: mental health among the elderly, dementia, suicide prevention; end-of-life decision making, medically-assisted-dying (the new Canada Bill 14); palliative care, caring for the care-givers; and the promotion of optimal physical, mental, social and spiritual health in this aging cohort.
• Previously (prior to retirement in 1997): The prevention of substance abuse (re. alcohol, tobacco, and illicit substances), including: development and evaluation of programs and policies to prevent substance use and/or abuse by children and adolescents; effectiveness of policies related to substance use and/or abuse in the general population.

Primary Teaching Responsibilities

Health promotion strategies and exploration of “critical issues” in health promotion; taking a best practice approach to decision-making in health promotion

Honours & Awards

Robin Badgley Teaching Excellence Award (Twice)

Current Research Projects

Since the early 1990s, my energies have been focused on developing conceptual and operational frameworks to assist health promotion and public health practitioners in making decisions based upon a solid foundation involving the interplay between evidence, theory and values. This initial “best practices” work, funded by Health Canada and undertaken in collaboration with Barbara Kahan and many others, resulted in the development of the Interactive Domain Model of best practices in health promotion(see http://www.idmbestpractices.ca/idm.php ).

For the past fifteen years, I have contributed to the development and implementation of research related to problem gambling–initially, through the Ontario Problem Gambling Research Centre and, more recently, through Gambling Research Exchange Ontario (www.greo.ca). 

Most recently, my attention has inevitably turned to the complex issues related to aging, including: mental health among the elderly, dementia, suicide prevention; end-of-life decision making, medically-assisted-dying (the new Canada Bill 14); palliative care, caring for the care-givers; and the promotion of optimal physical, mental, social and spiritual health in this aging cohort.

Finally, I continue to be involved in a host of community settings, including in my faith community, my residential community (The Beaches), and my “masters” (i.e., “older”) running community (see my recent photo-collage as evidence!)

representative publications

Goodstadt, M.S. Public Education About Cancer: Research Findings and Theoret­ical Concepts. UICC (International Union Against Cancer). Monograph Series, Volume 5, New York: Springer-Verlag, 1967.

Goodstadt, M.S. (Ed.). Research on Methods and Programs of Drug Educa­tion. Toronto: Addiction Research Foundation, 1974.

Goodstadt, M.S., & Gruson, V. The Randomized Response Technique: A Test on Drug Use. Journal of the American Statistical Association, 1975, 70(352), 814-818.

Goodstadt, M.S., Cook, G., Magid, S., & Gruson, V. Drug Attitude Scale (DAS): Its Development and Evaluation.” International Journal of Addic­tions, 1978, 13(8), 1307-1318.

Goodstadt, M.S. Alcohol and Drug Education: Models and Outcomes. Health Education Monographs, 1978, 6(3), 263-279.

Goodstadt, M.S., Chan, G.C., & Sheppard, M.A. Developmental and Genera­tional Trends in Alcohol, Cannabis and Tobacco Use – A Ten Year Cohort Analysis. Drug and Alcohol Dependence, 1982, 10, 303-320.

Goodstadt, M.S., & Sheppard, M.A. Three Approaches to Alcohol Educa­tion. Journal of Studies on Alcohol, 1983, 44(2), 362-380.

Goodstadt, M.S. Alcohol Education Research and Practice: A Logical Analysis of the Two Realities. Journal of Drug Education, 1986, 16, 349-365.

Goodstadt, M.S., Chan, G.C., Sheppard, M.A., & Cleve, J.C. Factors Associated with Cannabis Non Use and Cessation of Use: Between and Within Survey Replications of Findings. Addictive Behaviors, 1986, 11, 275-286.

Goodstadt, M.S., Simpson, R.I., & Loranger, P.O. Health Promotion: A Conceptualization for a Comprehensive Health Promotion System. American Journal of Health promo­tion, 1987, Winter, 58-63.

Kahan, B., & Goodstadt, M. Continuous quality improvement and health promotion. Health Promotion International, 1999, 14(1), 83-91.

Kahan, B., & Goodstadt, M. The Interactive Domain Model of Best Practices in Health Promotion: Developing and Implementing a Best Practices Approach to Health Promotion. Health Promotion Practice, 2001, 2(1), 43-67.

I. Rootman, M. Goodstadt, B. Hyndman, D. McQueen, L. Potvin, J. Springett, & E. Ziglio (Eds.). (2001). Evaluation in health promotion: Principles and perspectives . Copenhagen: World Health Organization.

Goodstadt.M.S. (In Press). Invited commentary on: Louis C Charland, et al. (2016), “Decision-Making Capacity to Consent to Medical Assistance in Dying for Persons with Mental Disorders”. Journal of Ethics in Mental Health Open volume.