Buffie Longmire-Avital, Ph.D.

Buffie Longmire-Avital is a diversity, inclusion and racial equity (D.I.R.E. ©) scholar-educator. In the academic year 2021-22, she became the first Black-identified faculty member promoted to the rank of professor in the College of Arts & Sciences at Elon University. Longmire-Avital is a member of the psychology department; the inaugural director of the Black Lumen Project, an equity initiative; and is currently serving as the presidential-appointed Faculty Administrative Fellow for Mentoring. She previously served as the coordinator of the African and African American Studies interdisciplinary minor program for six years. Longmire-Avital received her Ph.D. in applied developmental psychology from New York University’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Human Development. For nearly two decades, her research has focused on how systemic injustices in combination with various psychosocial factors contribute to health inequities that impact racial and sexual minorities. Through a critical community health frame, her primary research explores how the adoption of high-effort coping responses (e.g., strong Black woman, hyper vigilance) in response to chronic minority status stressors (e.g., daily encounters with discrimination, microaggressions, racism, poverty) play a part in the development of unhealthy lifestyle behaviors (e.g., high-risk sexual encounters, emotional eating) and mental-health outcomes for young collegiate adults. Longmire-Avital’s secondary research examines how virtual interventions creating and evaluating community-based intervention programs targeting Black American women living with chronic health conditions sustain their well-being, and increase self-care and self-compassionate beliefs. She has received both internal and external funding awards to support her ongoing health inequities research throughout her career. In 2023, she was one of 11 scholars awarded a fellowship through the Race, Religion and American Judaism Project. The initiative, which explores the ways Jewish parents talk about race and racism with their children, was funded through the Center for Jewish Ethics and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Longmire-Avital has published numerous articles and served on the editorial boards of multiple academic journals. As the Center for Engaged Learning (CEL) Scholar from 2018 to 2020, she wrote widely read CEL blogs focused on how to generate and sustain critically conscious, equitable approaches that support underserved and often invisible students’ engagement in High Impact Practices through critically informed reparative mentorship. Longmire-Avital has received numerous awards in recognition of her excellence in mentorship as well as leadership service. She is also a recipient of the prestigious National Institutes of Health Loan Repayment Program for Health Disparities and a National Research Service Award.