Hollis Karoly is an assistant professor of psychology at Colorado State University.  

Her research explores the neural, biological and behavioral underpinnings of substance use and addictive disorders, with a particular focus on alcohol, cannabis and most recently, kratom. Karoly’s lab takes a translational and highly interdisciplinary approach, combining tools and methods from psychology, neuroscience, immunology and genetics to better understand addiction, with the goal of improving treatment and informing harm reduction efforts.  

One of her projects is a grant-funded series of studies testing the acute effect of legal market cannabis when combined with alcohol – work that has the potential to offer important insights for public health and safety.  

Karoly also conducted field work collecting data from the patrons of local kratom bars to better understand how people use this substance in these emerging recreational spaces.  

She earned her Ph.D in the biological basis of behavior from the University of Pennsylvania, as well as an M.A. in psychology and a dual Ph.D in clinical psychology from the University of Colorado Boulder.  

Karoly’s research has been published in Addiction, Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research and more.