The Scientific Case for Love as a Vaccine Against Violence

Prof. Dr. Dr. SD Shanti is a multi-disciplinary public health professional with a focus on violence and depression prevention and the translation of science into practice. Her work in violence prevention and health information dissemination has been supported by foundations in the United States, Switzerland and the UK and by UNICEF. The origins of her innovations are rooted in her time as a research associate at the Universities of Basel and Fribourg in Switzerland, and were crystallized during a fellowship at Stanford University. The NGO that she founded was admitted to the Violence Prevention Alliance of the World Health Organization, based on a review of the science behind the methods.

She was inspired to look for new ways to advance violence and depression prevention modalities because of the pessimism and hopelessness that many mental health and public health experts shared with her in private.

She is currently working to advance the worldwide diffusion and adoption of violence and depression prevention modalities with an emphasis on population-level skills training, changing harmful social norms and reducing negative social determinants of health.

She holds a Doctor of Dental Surgery degree from Northwestern University, a PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of Vermont and a Masters in Public Health from Harvard University. Additionally, she has done a post-doctoral fellowship in Behavioral Sciences at the University of Washington and specialty training in Pediatric Dentistry at the University of Rochester in the United States. Her professional experiences encompass academia, public health and the private sector. Dr. Shanti's desire to improve children's health motivated her to further study psychology and to make a commitment to advancing violence prevention and depression prevention.