Marion Becker is a tenured Professor in the Department of Mental Health Law and Policy at the Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute, a college located at the University of South Florida (USF). She also holds appointments in the USF School of Social Work and the Colleges of Public Health and Nursing. Dr Becker is a psychiatric nurse with a PhD in Social Welfare from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her research focuses on the problems of providing high quality cost-effective behavioral health services and quality of life outcomes for vulnerable populations. Dr. Becker is the developer of the Wisconsin Quality of Life Index (W-QLI), a core development in quality of life outcomes research in mental health. In 1997 she received the National Alliance for Mental Health (NAMI) Research Award for her quality of life outcomes research. Dr Becker has served as Principle Investigator and Co-PI on numerous outcome studies. Most recently she served as Co-PI, and Lead Evaluator for the Triad Women's Project, a multi-million dollar, competitive federal grant designed to create and evaluate specialized interventions for women with alcohol, drug abuse and mental disorders who have histories of interpersonal violence. Along with that research she continues her focus on quality of life outcomes across the life span and linking outcomes research to clinical practice.