PhD candidate Veronica Pear receives dissertation grant to study gun violence

Veronica Pear, MPH, UC Berkeley School of Public Health epidemiology PhD candidate, has received a $25,000 dissertation grant to study gun violence from the National Collaborative on Gun Violence Research.

“The award will facilitate the completion of my dissertation over the next year by allowing me to devote more time to this project, but more importantly, it will allow me to learn from and collaborate with my peers in the field of firearm violence through monthly meetings with fellow grantees,” said Pear.

Pear’s work seeks to determine whether individuals in communities with access to firearms are more likely to be victims of gun violence, and conversely, if removal of firearm access from high-risk individuals leads them to have a lower likelihood of experiencing of gun violence.

Pear hopes her dissertation study will further the understanding of the role of community- and individual-level firearm accessibility on firearm violence. Findings could inform local interventions to prevent firearm violence through zoning of firearm dealers and alcohol outlets and will provide among the first quantitative evaluations of California’s gun violence restraining order law.