Dr. Brad Cox — open-book logo

Research

My research uses quantitative and qualitative methods to examine factors that shape college experiences and outcomes for student populations often overlooked within higher education, including racially minoritized students, transfer students, adults, students facing difficult life events, and first-generation college students. Collectively, these research projects have earned more than $1.1 million in grant funding and generated dozens of articles in highly-respected journals.

My most recent scholarship focuses on the ways personal characteristics and institutional environments affect autistic college students, including the PEACES Project, which highlights autistic collegians’ own definitions of success. In 2016, I founded the nonprofit College Autism Network to connect research, policy, and practice.

Brad Cox beside his INSAR 2019 research poster on postsecondary students with autism-related characteristics in STEM fieldsBrad Cox and co-presenters at an AERA conference session on autistic college students' identity formation

Projects

PEACES: Autistic College Student Success

Understanding college success through autistic students' own experiences and priorities.

Postsecondary Education: Autistic Collegians' Experiences of Success (PEACES) is a national, longitudinal study of how autistic students define and experience success in college. Through surveys, interviews, and photo-based storytelling, the project examines the personal, social, psychological, academic, and professional dimensions of students' lives. It centers perspectives often overlooked in higher education research, including those of women, racially minoritized students, LGBTQ+ students, and community college students. The findings inform campus practice and create a foundation for further research on autistic students' well-being and college experiences.

FAST: Facilitating Autistic Student Transitions

Connecting the systems that support autistic students across education and adult life.

FAST develops a research agenda for improving transitions across the systems that shape autistic students' educational journeys. It focuses on connections among K-12 transition planning, higher education, employment, healthcare, and disability services such as vocational rehabilitation. Supported by a Spencer Foundation Vision Grant, the project identifies opportunities for coordinated research and systems change. Its goal is to guide future work that makes support more connected across educational and adult-life transitions.

AI Policies in College Syllabi

Examining how instructors communicate the rules for AI in college coursework.

AI Policies in College Syllabi investigates how instructors communicate expectations for generative AI in their courses. Starting with publicly available UT Austin syllabi from fall 2022 onward, the study is designed to compare policies across disciplines, course levels, and time. Its planned approach combines systematic document collection with AI-assisted analysis of permitted uses and the clarity and specificity of course rules. The goal is to inform clearer policies and more inclusive teaching, with particular attention to neurodivergent students and students who use English as an additional language.

AI Tools for Research and Teaching

Developing user-friendly resources to help researchers and students maintain scholarly rigor, integrity, and consistency when using generative artificial intelligence (AI).

AI Tools brings together practical resources for using artificial intelligence in research, teaching, and academic work. The collection includes an AI-System Rulebook, guidance for using it, and a classroom AI-use policy that educators can adapt. These resources emphasize clear expectations, responsible authorship, source verification, and transparent disclosure of AI use. The aim is to make AI-assisted work more consistent, auditable, and useful while keeping scholarly judgment with the researcher or educator.

Parsing the First Year of College

Connecting academic affairs, student affairs, and faculty instruction to student experiences in the first year of college.

Parsing the First Year of College was a national research project examining how institutional policies and faculty practices shape first-year student success. Through surveys of chief academic officers and faculty alongside institutional policy analysis, the project documented how colleges structure the first-year experience and how faculty behaviors influence student interaction and engagement. Its findings informed research on teaching culture, faculty approachability, differences in first-year courses, and methods for handling missing data in higher education studies.

LIPSS: Linking Institutional Policy to Student Success

Exploring connections between institution-level policies and student engagement at 57 institutions across five states.

The LIPSS project sought to identify specific institution-wide policies that can be leveraged to increase college student engagement – a key predictor of student grades and persistence that is especially beneficial to underrepresented and academically under-prepared students. Data were collected from 57 institutions in Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, California, and Iowa. Its findings informed work on first-generation student benchmarks, student affairs practices for adult undergraduates, and data-driven decision making in higher education.

Publications

  43. Cover of The 2003 National Survey on First-Year Seminars

    2005 · Overview of Survey Responses · The 2003 National Survey on First-Year Seminars: Continuing Innovations in the Collegiate Curriculum

    • Faculty and Teaching
    • First Year Experience
    • Book Chapter