Rate My Professor Sam McCrabb

Dr. Sam McCrabb is a behavioural scientist and implementation researcher working in public health at the University of Newcastle, Australia. A graduate of the University of Newcastle, he completed his Bachelor of Psychology in 2013 and was awarded his PhD within the field of Behavioural Science in Relation to Smoking Cessation in March 2018 without revisions. Currently, as a full-time Senior Research Officer and postdoctoral researcher in the School of Medicine and Public Health, embedded within the New South Wales Health Service, McCrabb manages the SPARKE Collaboration—a global consortium funded by an NHMRC MRFF grant in 2022 to prevent e-cigarette use among youth. His academic interests include behavioural science, implementation research, public health, vaping research, systematic reviews, chronic disease prevention, health promotion, evidence synthesis, prospective meta-analysis, smoking cessation, tobacco control, and vaping prevention. With over ten years of experience, he holds positions such as Assistant Managing Editor for Cochrane Public Health since 2018, former Methods Editor (2020–2023), executive member of the Cochrane Nutrition and Physical Activity Thematic Group (since 2023), and member of the Cochrane People Health Systems and Public Health Thematic Group (since 2023).

McCrabb has led influential Cochrane systematic reviews on implementation strategies in schools (2022), interventions to prevent or cease e-cigarette use in children and adolescents (2022, 2023), and healthy eating interventions delivered in early childhood education and care settings for children aged six years and below (2021, 2023). He provided evidence synthesis for the World Health Organization on e-cigarette prevalence in children and adolescents (2021) and Learning Health Systems for prevention (2024), contributed to an umbrella review for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization on fruit and vegetable consumption (2021), and prepared research briefs for the New South Wales Ministry of Health on implementation of health policies (2021), healthy eating and active living in primary (2021) and secondary schools (2022). His review on internet-based smoking cessation programs (2019) was cited by the Community Prevention Services Taskforce, leading to a recommendation change. Key publications include "Scaling-up evidence-based obesity interventions: a systematic review assessing intervention adaptations and effectiveness and quantifying the scale-up penalty" (Obesity Reviews, 2019), "Internet-Based Programs Incorporating Behavior Change Techniques Are Associated With Increased Smoking Cessation in the General Population: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis" (Annals of Behavioral Medicine, 2019), "Prevalence of electronic nicotine delivery systems and electronic non-nicotine delivery systems in children and adolescents: a systematic review and meta-analysis" (The Lancet Public Health, 2021), and "Strategies for enhancing the implementation of school-based policies or practices targeting diet, physical activity, obesity, tobacco or alcohol use" (Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, 2022). He received the Amanda Simm Cancer Research Award (2020) and the Hunter Cancer Research Alliance Best Paper Award in Implementation Science and Impact (2020).