His teaching in population health and prevention science at CGU links faculty and students with the practice of translational research.
Prior to his arrival at CGU, Johnson was founding director of the Institute for Health Promotion & Disease Prevention Research (IPR), and Sidney Garfield Professor of Health Sciences and Professor of Preventive Medicine & Psychology at the University of Southern California (USC).
Prior to his arrival at USC he did postdoctoral work in environmental psychology at the National Bureau of Standards and held a faculty position at the University of Minnesota.
His research contributions include mechanisms of action in community-based approaches to tobacco-, alcohol-, and drug-abuse prevention.
His recent research has focused on social and cultural change acting in combination with genetically and environmentally driven dispositional characteristics to influence health risk behaviors, including socio-cultural and dispositional interactions influencing the effectiveness of smoking and alcohol abuse prevention programs.