Dr. Riddle earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1991. During her time as a UCLA Bruin, Melissa learned behavioral approaches for treating autism, for conducting in-home family therapy, and for data management for community-based studies on HIV risk. Melissa earned a doctorate in clinical psychology from the University of Arizona in 1998. Her doctoral research combined family therapy and health psychology, asking questions related to how patients and their families cope with chronic or serious illness. In 1998, 3 days after defending her dissertation, Melissa started a 2 ½ year postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania. During this fellowship, her research and clinical care focused on the psychosocial impact of genetic testing for breast and ovarian cancer for women and their families. In 2001, Melissa joined the National Institute on Drug Abuse at the National Institutes of Health, overseeing a grants program on behavioral treatments for drug addiction and HIV risk behavior. She joined the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research in 2007, as chief of a new branch on behavioral and social sciences research. In 2008, she also became the coordinator of 9 large, NIH Roadmap-funded research consortia whose purpose is to bring an interdisciplinary approach to solving complex health problems. Melissa has been working with colleagues on the NIH Common Fund Science of Behavior Change initiative since it began. She sees tremendous promise in the SOBC experimental medicine approach to behavior change, focused on understanding how behavior change happens, and on infusing studies of causal mechanisms into every stage of behavior change research.