Chief Research Officer, Senior Research Psychologist
Graduated Northwestern University, 1988 (Psychology, Methodology and Evaluation Research with minors in statistics and management of R & D) and Macalester College, 1982 (Psychology and Political Science)
Specialty areas: methodology; program evaluation; measurement; randomized field experiments; substance use disorder (SUD) adult and adolescent treatment; integrated care across legal/welfare; health care; and behavioral healthcare; Recovery Management Checkups (RMC); Global Appraisal of Individual Needs (GAIN); technology transfer and information dissemination
Dr. Michael Dennis received his PhD in Psychology from Northwestern University under a NIH fellowship to train more methodologists in how to implement and improve the quality of community-based behavioral health research. His dissertation was on implementing randomized field experiments in criminal and civil justice research to improve their impact on practice. He currently serves as Chief Research Officer at Chestnut Health Systems. Lighthouse Institute (LI), the research division of Chestnut Health Systems conducts community-based research, program evaluation, and training on evidence-based practices. LI currently has offices in Bloomington-Normal and Chicago, Illinois and Eugene, Oregon; offsite staff in over two dozen states; over 100 LI staff operating four major centers related to training on assessment, evidence-based treatment, family coaching, program evaluation; and a Native-led national Native Center of Excellence. LI works with community-based agencies in all 50 of the United States, four U.S. territories, and over four dozen tribal serving agencies, as well as all Canadian provinces and over a dozen other countries. Part of LI’s community focus includes the use of service cascades, simplified time series, and economic analysis from the agency and funder perspectives to aid in program planning and management. In addition to supporting a diverse workforce that reflects the communities we serve, LI is working to become a home for supporting the career development and work of researchers with personal lived experience in addiction, recovery, and the legal system.
As a senior research scientist, Dr. Dennis is currently the Principal Investigator (PI) of the Smartphone Addiction Recovery Coach for Young Adults (SARC-YA) experiment (DA011323) and a Multiple PI (with Dr. Christine Grella) of Improving Retention across the OUD Service Cascade upon Reentry from Jail using Recovery Management Checkups (UG1DA050065). The latter is part of NIDA’s HEAL Justice Community Opioid Innovation Network (JCOIN) cooperative. He also serves as the Co-Investigator on Dr. Dennis Watson’s Recovery Management Checkups for Primary Care (RMCPC) experiment (R01AA024440); Dr. Chris Grella’s Recovery Initiation and Management after Overdose (RIMO) Experiment (R33DA045774); and Dr. Kate Elkington’s Original and Scaling up eConnect in Juvenile Probation Settings, a hybrid implementation effectiveness trial of a digital suicide risk/behavior identification and linkage-to-treatment system (MH113599, MH130845).
In the past, he has been the Coordinating Center PI on the Juvenile Justice Translational Research for Adolescents in the Legal System (JJ-TRIALS; U01DA036221) cooperative agreement and the Cannabis Youth Treatment experiment, as well as Dr. Chris Scott’s Recovery Management Checkups for Woman Offenders Experiment (5R01DA21174). JJ-TRIALS is one of the largest and most recent studies of transitional research with adolescents and included national surveys of juvenile justice community supervision to examine their behavioral health services related to suicide, mental health, substance use, and HIV risk reduction. The study also included a multisite experiment to examine LI’s ability to improve the behavioral health service cascades from the justice system to behavioral health (e.g., screening, identification, need, referral, treatment initiation, engagement, and continuing care). HEAL supplements were also used to conduct surveys of a census of the state prison systems and county jails hardest hit by the opioid epidemic. The Cannabis Youth Treatment (CYT) experiment was one of the first to evaluate five manualized approaches compared on a large sample of youth and families studied (600), with high rates of participation, treatment fidelity, follow-up, publication, and impact in terms of citations and replication. To date, the Dennis et al. (2004) CYT main findings have been cited over 1,000 times. Dr. Dennis has also participated in the conduct of a half dozen other treatment experiments, development of research-based treatment guidelines, and has chaired both major adolescent treatment associations (JMATE and SASATE). The significance of this work led to his receiving the Joint Meeting on Adolescent Treatment Effectiveness (JMATE) Research to Evidence-Based Practice award for bridging the gap between adolescent treatment research and practice.
Dr. Dennis and his colleagues developed Recovery Management Checkups (RMC) and demonstrated efficacy in four clinical trials and a quasi-experiment to date. He received a MERIT award (R37DA011323) from NIDA after LI’s first clinical trial and the 2012 Dan Anderson Award for Addiction and Recovery Research for his 2012 paper reporting on the main findings from our second trial. He and his colleagues have also worked with economists to demonstrate that the cost of RMC and increased treatment is offset by reductions in expensive health care utilization (e.g., emergency department visits, hospital stays, psychiatric hospitalization, incarceration), and have replicated this work with the State of Illinois to use RMC to recruit over 1,000 additional clients into methadone treatment. As part of NIDA’s HEAL JCOIN cooperative, LI is currently conducting a fifth experiment with RMC for people with opioid use disorders (OUD) coming from Cook County Jail, a study that is expanding into five other county jails. He has worked with individuals with OUD since 1988 on medications for opioid use disorders (MOUD) treatment initiation, retention, readmission, and recovery support and has experience working within the community, in a variety of MOUD and other types of treatment, as part of continuum of care studies, and as part of studying and managing long-term recovery over periods of 6 months to 19 years.
To integrate measurement, clinical research, and practice, Dr. Dennis has also led the development of the Global Appraisal of Individual Needs (GAIN) family of measures since 1993. As of January 2025, the GAIN Coordinating Center (www.gaincc.org) has worked with over 22,685 staff from 5,676 agencies (in all 50 states in the U.S., all 10 provinces of Canada, and 15 other countries), teaching them how to utilize the GAIN measures to support clinical decision making related to diagnosis, treatment planning, placement, outcome monitoring, economic evaluation and program/policy planning. The GAIN has also been used in over 900 publications. This includes using formal measurement models to create shorter and more efficient versions of the GAIN to get much of the core information in less time. The significance of this work led to Dr. Dennis receiving the International Council on Alcoholism and Addiction (ICAA) lifetime achievement award for his work with the GAIN. He has been PI, Co-PI, or lead methodologist on a dozen clinical trials, chaired one of NIDA’s data safety monitoring boards, chaired NIAAA’s health services research review group, and served on multiple editorial boards.
Selected Publications:
Dennis, M. L., Chan, Y. F., & Funk, R. R. (2006). Development and validation of the GAIN Short Screener (GSS) for internalizing, externalizing and substance use disorders and crime/violence problems among adolescents and adults. The American Journal on Addictions, 15(1), 80–91. PMID: 17574804 PMCID: PMC5933850. https://doi.org/10.1080/10550490601006055
Dennis, M. L., & Davis, J. P. (2021). Screening for more with less: Validation of the Global Appraisal of Individual Needs Quick v3 (GAIN-Q3) screeners. Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, 126, Article 108414. PMCID: PMC819777. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsat.2021.108414
Dennis, M. L., Godley, S. H., Diamond, G., Tims, F. M., Babor, T., Donaldson, J., Liddle, H., Titus, J. C., Kaminer, Y., Webb, C., Hamilton, N., & Funk, R. (2004). The Cannabis Youth Treatment (CYT) study: Main findings from two randomized trials. Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, 27(3), 197–213. PMID: 15501373 (predates PMCID journal requirement). Click here to view Appendix. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsat.2003.09.005
Dennis, M. L., Ingram, P. W., Burks, M. E., & Rachal, J. V. (1994). Effectiveness of streamlined admissions to methadone treatment: A simplified time-series analysis. Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, 26(2), 207–216. PMID: 7931865 (predates PMCID). https://doi.org/10.1080/02791072.1994.10472268
Dennis, M. L., Perl, H. I., Huebner, R. B., & McLellan, A. T. (2000). Twenty-five strategies for improving the design, implementation and analysis of health services research related to alcohol and other drug abuse treatment. Addiction, 95(Suppl. 3), 281–308. PMID: 11132359 (predates PCMID requirement). https://doi.org/10.1080/09652140020004241
Dennis, M., & Scott, C. K (2007). Managing addiction as a chronic condition. Addiction Science & Clinical Practice, 4(1), 45–55. PMCID: PMC5933850. https://doi.org/10.1151/ascp074145
Dennis, M. L., & Scott, C. K (2012). Four-year outcomes from the Early Re-Intervention (ERI) experiment with Recovery Management Checkups (RMC). Drug and Alcohol Dependence 121(1-2), 10–17. PMC3277866. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2011.07.026
Dennis, M. L., Foss, M. A., & Scott, C. K (2007). An eight-year perspective on the relationship between the duration of abstinence and other aspects of recovery. Evaluation Review, 31(6), 585–612. PMID: 17986709. https://doi.org/10.1177/0193841X07307771
Dennis, M. L., Scott, C. K., & Funk, R. (2003). An experimental evaluation of recovery management checkups (RMC) for people with chronic substance use disorders. Evaluation and Program Planning, 26(3), 339–352. PMCID: PMC6054319. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0149-7189(03)00037-5
Dennis, M. L., Scott, C. K, Funk, R., & Foss, M. A. (2005). The duration and correlates of addiction and treatment careers. Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, 28(Suppl. 1), 51–62. PMID: 15797639 9 (Predates PMCID journal requirement). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsat.2004.10.013
Dennis, M. L., Smith, C. N., Belenko, S., Knight, D., McReynolds, L., Rowan, G., Dembo, R., DiClemente, R., Robertson, A., & Wiley, T. (2019). Operationalizing a behavioral health services cascade of care model: Lessons learned from a 33-site implementation in juvenile justice community supervision. Federal Probation, 83(2), 52–64. PMCID: PMC8341285.
Dennis, M. L., Wechsberg, W. M., McDermeit, M., Campbell, R. S., & Rasch, R. R. (2001). The correlates and predictive validity of HIV risk groups among drug users in a community-based sample: Methodological findings from a multi-site cluster analysis. Evaluation and Program Planning, 24(2), 187–206. PMCID: PMC8559767. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0149-7189(01)00014-3
Elkington, K. S., Wasserman, G. A., Ryan, M. E., Sichel, C. E., Sarapas, C., Dennis, M. L., Taxman, F. S. (2023) E-Connect: Linking probation youth at risk for suicide to behavioral health services. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 91(9), 547–557. PMCID: MC10526689. https://doi.org/10.1037/ccp0000824
Godley, M. D., Godley, S. H., Dennis, M. L., Funk, R. R., Passetti, L. L., & Petry, N. M. (2014). A randomized trial of assertive continuing care and contingency management for adolescents with substance use disorders. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 82(1), 40–51. PMID: 24294838 PMCID: PMC3938115. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0035264
Scott, C. K, Dennis, M. L., Grella, C. E., & Watson, D. P. (2021). Improving retention across the OUD service cascade upon reentry from jail using Recovery Management Checkups-Adaptive (RMC-A) experiment. Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, 128, 108245. PMCID: PMC8192586. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsat.2020.108245
Scott, C. K, Dennis, M. L., Grella, C. E., Watson, D. P., Davis, J. P., Hart, K. (2023). A randomized controlled trial of recovery management checkups for primary care patients: Twelve‐month results. Alcohol Clinical and Experimental Research, 47(10), 1964–1977. PMID: 341168 (PMCID not assigned yet). https://doi.org/10.1111/acer.15172
Scott, C. K, Dennis, M. L., Laudet, A., Funk, R. R., & Simeone, R. S. (2011). Surviving drug addiction: The effect of treatment and abstinence on morality. American Journal of Public Health, 101(4), 737–744. PMCID: PMC3052346. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2010.197038
Scott, C. K, Dennis, M. L., & Lurigio, A. J. (2017). The effects of specialized probation and Recovery Management Checkups (RMCs) on treatment participation, substance use, HIV-risk behaviors, and recidivism among female offenders: Main findings of a three-year experiment using subject by intervention interaction analysis. Journal of Experimental Criminology, 13(1), 53–77. PMID: 28966568. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11292-016-9281-z
Scott, C. K., Grella, C. E., Dennis, M. L., Carnevale, J., & LaVallee, R. (2022). Availability of best practices for opioid use disorder in jails and related training and resource needs: findings from a national interview study of jails in heavily impacted counties in the U.S. Health & Justice, 10(1), 36. PMCID: PMC10015976. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40352-022-00197-3
Selected Grants and Contracts:
Principal Investigator: Smartphone Addiction Recovery Coach for Young Adults (SARC-YA) experiment (NIDA: DA011323, 2017–2024)
Co-Investigator: Improving Retention across the OUD Service Cascade upon Reentry from Jail using Recovery Management Checkups (NIH/NIDA: UG1DA050065, 2019–2024)
Co-Investigator: Recovery Management Checkups for Primary Care (RMC-PC) experiment (NIAAA: R01AA024440, 2017–2024)
Co-Investigator: Recovery Initiation and Management after Overdose (RIMO) Experiment (NIDA: R33DA045774, 2017–2023)
Co-Investigator: Scaling up eConnect in Juvenile Probation Settings, a hybrid implementation effectiveness trial of a digital suicide risk/behavior identification and linkage-to-treatment system (NIH: MH113599, MH130845, 2022–2026)
Appointments and Awards:
Received the Joint Meeting on Adolescent Treatment Effectiveness (JMATE) Research to Evidence-Based Practice award for bridging the gap between adolescent treatment research and practice (2006)
Received the MERIT award (R37DA011323) from NIDA after the first clinical trial on Recovery Management Checkups (RMC) and the 2012 Dan Anderson Award for Addiction and Recovery Research for his 2012 paper reporting on the main findings from this second trial on RMC
Received the International Council on Alcoholism and Addiction (ICAA) lifetime achievement award for his work with the GAIN
Chaired one of NIDA’s data safety monitoring boards
Chaired NIAAA’s health services research review group
Served on multiple journal editorial boards
Related Links:
Remote Observed Methadone Evaluation Phase 2 (ROME 2)
This SBIR Phase II study continues to evaluate Sonara, a HIPAA-compliant web-application (app) with 2-way text messaging between patient and clinical team (counselor, nurse), that is designed to facilitate methadone take-home monitoring for two cohorts: 1) a group of long term clients who have plateaued at weekly take home (1 clinic visit per week with 6 days of take-homes) for 6 months or more and 2) a group of new clients as they first go onto weekly take home (with 1 or 2 clinic visits per week).
Regional Partnership Grant (RPG): Connecticut Strengthening Families Together (CT SFT)
The new program, Multidimensional Family Treatment and Recovery (MDFTR), works with parents/caregivers who have substance use disorders both to address their SUD directly and indirectly to prevent or reduce child maltreatment and out-of-home placement for children under age six (prenatal through 5 years inclusive).
Scaling up eConnect in Juvenile Probation Settings: A Hybrid Implementation-Effectiveness Trial of a Digital Suicide Risk/Behavior Identification and Linkage-to-Treatment System (e-Connect-IN)
The purpose of the project is to develop and test a software application that seeks to improve delivery of mental health services and reduce suicide risk in adolescents transitioning out of the juvenile justice system.
Justice Community Opioid Innovation Network (JCOIN): Improving Retention across the OUD Service Cascade upon Reentry from Jail using Recovery Management Checkups (RMC-A) Experiment
Jails provide an optimal setting for intervening with individuals with opioid use disorders (OUD), given the high volume of offenders with OUD, and their high risk of relapse to opioids following their release to the community. It is imperative that individuals with OUD are linked to community-based medication assisted treatment (MAT) upon their re-entry, as well as receive support for their ongoing treatment retention and recovery.
e-Connect NY
The purpose of the project was to develop and test a software application that seeks to improve delivery of mental health services and reduce suicide risk in adolescents transitioning out of the juvenile justice system.
Boruch, R. F., & Dennis, M. L. (1986). Cooperation in field experiments versus observational surveys. In Second Annual Research Conference, March 23-26, 1986: proceedings (pp. 196-318). U.S. Bureau of the Census
Boruch, R. F., Dennis, M. L., & Matt, G. (1986). Meanings and methods in evaluation: Philosophical, cross-cultural, and historical perspectives. UNESCO.
Boruch, R. F., Riess, A., Lartnz, K., Dennis, M. L., Sherman, L., & Garner, J. (1988). In Proceedings of the roundtable of principal investigators of NIJ-funded randomized experiments. Northwestern University
Brown, M. A., Morell, J. A., Vineyard, T., Weaver, R., Friggle, W. E., White, D. L., English, M. R., & Dennis, M. L. (1986). Program planning workbook for the 1986 SECP/EES all states program managers' conference. SECP/Energy Extension Service
Burkheimer, G. J., Dennis, M. L., Cox, J. L., Iachan, R., & Strang, E. W. (1989). A descriptive study of Chapter 1 Migrant Education Program: Data collection, sampling, and analysis plans (Technical document under Contract No. LC-88-025-001 with U.S. Department of Education). Research Triangle Park, NC: Research Triangle Institute.
Conrad, K. J., Conrad, K. M., Dennis, M. L., Riley, B. B., & Funk, R. (2009). Validation of the Behavioral Complexity Scale (BCS) to the Rasch measurement model, GAIN methods report 1.1. Chestnut Health Systems.
Conrad, K. J., Conrad, K. M., Riley, B. B., Funk, R., & Dennis, M. L. (2009). Validation of the Current Withdrawal Scale (CWS) to the Rasch measurement model, GAIN methods report 1.0. Chestnut Health Systems
Conrad, K. J., Conrad, K. M., Riley, B. B., Funk, R., & Dennis, M. L. (2009). Validation of the Current Withdrawal Scale (CWS) to the Rasch measurement model, GAIN methods report 1.0. Chestnut Health Systems.
Conrad, K. J., Conrad, K. M., Riley, B. B., Funk, R., & Dennis, M. L. (2010). Validation of the Personality Coping Styles Scale (PCSS) to the Rasch measurement model, GAIN methods report 1.0. Chestnut Health Systems.
Conrad, K. J., Conrad, K. M., Scott, C. K, Funk, R. R., & Dennis, M. L. (2013). Age and substance differences in substance use disorders (SUD) items: For an older adult SUD scale. Gerontologist, 53, 29-30.
Kahn, J. H., Hart, M. K., Watson, D. P., Allen, C. B., Singh, R. R., Grella, C. E., & Dennis, M. L. (2025). Recent incarceration and minoritized racial status as barriers to the effectiveness of Recovery Management Checkups. Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy, 20(53). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13011-025-00684-4
Kahn, J. H., Hart, M. K., Watson, D. P., Allen, C. B., Singh, R. R., Grella, C. E., & Dennis, M. L. (2025). Recent incarceration and minoritized racial status as barriers to the effectiveness of Recovery Management Checkups. Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy, 20(53). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13011-025-00684-4
Sarapas, C., Sichel, C. E., Dennis, M. L., Wasserman, G. A., Taxman, F. S., Auerbach, R. P., Mroczkowski, M. M., Ryan, M. E., & Elkington, K. S. (2025). Predictive Validity of the e-Connect Suicide Risk Classification Algorithm in Youth on Probation. JAACAP open, 3(4), 1076–1086. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaacop.2025.04.006
Titus, J. C., Feeney, T., Smith, D. C., Rivers, T. L., Kelly, L. L., & Dennis, M. L. (2012). GAIN-Q3 3.1: Administration, clinical interpretation, and brief intervention. Chestnut Health Systems. http://gaincc.org/GAINQ3
Wallis, J., & Dennis, M. L. (2026, February 11). Using service cascades to help close the loop. In Closing the loop: Measuring what matters in whole person care [Panel presentation]. Open Minds Performance Management Institute, Clearwater Beach, FL, United States. https://openminds.com/market-intelligence/presentation/closing-the-loop-measuring-what-matters-in-whole-person-care/