Faculty & Staff

Constance M. Dallas, PhD, RN

Associate Professor
Department of Health Systems Science

NURS 952
UIC College of Nursing
845 South Damen Avenue (MC 802)
Chicago, IL 60612-7350

Phone: 312.413.7859
Email: dallascm@uic.edu

Research / Discovery

Constance M. Dallas is an Associate Professor in the College of Nursing. She uses an ecological approach to develop a theory of involvement for low-income African American fathers within the context of their families and their environments. Her qualitative approach includes obtaining the perspectives of multi-generational family members and extended family members, who shape the fatherhood role of men who become fathers during adolescence and adult fathers who have children with multiple partners. Dr. Dallas recently completed an NIH-funded longitudinal study describing father involvement for unmarried, low-income African American adolescent fathers from the multiple perspectives of the adolescent parents and their parents. Findings indicated that the paternal grandmothers' support of adolescent fathers may be essential to these fathers' continued involvement with their children. Dr. Dallas is presently examining father involvement in low-income African American families with children who share the same biological father but have different biological mothers from the multiple perspectives of their families, the mothers of their children, extended family members, and selected peers.

Dr. Dallas is collaborates with colleagues at the UIC Jane Addams School of Social work to examine the impact of child welfare and criminal justice services on African American fathers involvement with their children after release from incarceration. Her research has been presented both nationally and internationally and has been published in a variety of peer-reviewed journals.

Teaching / Learning

Dr. Dallas teaches qualitative research methods and health policy at the graduate level.

Service / Practice

Dr. Dallas served on the steering committee that presented State of the African American Family: The Migration Pattern of Chicago Public Housing Residents to State Legislators and community stakeholders in 2010, which was a collaborative effort with the Illinois African American Family Commission, the UIC Jane Addams School of Social Work, the UIC College of Urban Planning and Public Administration and the Chicago Convention on the Rights of the Child. She has served as both the Director and Interim Director for the College of Nursing Urban Health Program from 2007 - 2010 and served as an Interim Co-Director for the Institute for Research on Race and Public Policy at the University of Illinois at Chicago from 2008-2010.