For Lightner, experiencing and understanding different cultures is important to him, not only as a person, but as a researcher as well. Getting out of his own social context broadens what he can learn. Over the next year, he’ll be in Brazil for three months, then Puerto Rico, back to the United States and then off to South Africa for another research project.

“I think the United States has a lot to learn from other countries,” Lightner said. “What are those things that really make a population healthy? How are those things health protective? And then, how do we create interventions in the United States that can mimic the mechanism of change in other places?”

The impetus for the Fulbright project began when Lightner was invited to speak at a zero-fare conference in Rio de Janeiro. His talk piqued the interest of researchers at the Rio de Janeiro State University. The group immediately began strategizing on how they could work together. That’s when the Fulbright award came about.

The goal of the project is to understand what impact zero-fare policies will have on physical activity, overall health and ancillary things like grocery store trips or doctor visits. Lightner will travel to Brazil in August to begin the study.  The team will collect data from six urban cities in Brazil, three cities with zero fare and three that do not.

Lightner is eager to learn more about Brazil’s unique bus system and how it compares to Kansas City and beyond. According to Lightner, bus systems in the United States are operated by the government, where drivers are essentially public employees. In Brazil, the bus system is a public-private partnership, where individual companies run a city’s bus system, funded by a tax on employers.

“I’m astonished by the fact that they can have this public-private partnership where it looks and feels very much like the United States, but it works so much better,” Lightner said. “What can the United States and Kansas City learn from these environments where so many people are taking transit and walking more?”

According to Lightner, transportation adoption is high in Brazil compared to the United States where about 1% of trips are made on public transportation. Whereas in Brazil, it’s anywhere between 20% to 50%. Because of that, zero fare can make a huge impact. Brazil has the largest zero-fare transit system in the world. It has about 220 million people, and about 150 mid-sized cities in the country have zero fare.

The research team is hoping to recruit about 600 people, connecting with them through community centers, health departments and municipal city halls. Once the study begins, each participant will receive a research-grade accelerometer – similar to a smart watch but waist mounted and more accurate – and a GPS tracker. Each week, participants will return their accelerometers and GPS trackers, which the team will pull the data from. Then participants will get a new set of trackers and come back in a week. Brazil has a national healthcare system with extensive electronic records so it will be simple for the team to gather information like number of doctor visits and overall health indicators like blood pressure.

The other members of the research team at Rio de Janeiro State University are excited about the opportunity to collaborate. For Magno Garcia, Ph.D., the project will be part of his post-doctoral fellowship. Lightner is already helping him improve as a researcher, emphasizing the viewpoint of study participants and how that affects their behavior.

“Lightner is a good researcher to learn from because of his creativity and how he motivates,” Garcia said. “He provides opportunities to improve my knowledge and help me understand the best way to assess things. I’m so thankful for him.”

On the project, Garcia will mainly be collecting and organizing the data for the project. He’s hopeful that with good data from his community, he can better understand behavior and create innovative policy to encourage physical activity for Brazilians.

According to Jamie Hunt, faculty member in the Department of Health Sciences, Lightner's work demonstrates how innovative research can address real-world challenges and improve lives.

“Lightner’s pioneering research on equitable transportation policy has already influenced national conversations,” Hunt said. “His Fulbright work in Brazil will further advance global understanding of how transportation systems can promote health, opportunity and social equity”.

For Hunt, the Fulbright project reflects Lightner’s commitment to advancing equitable, community-centered solutions on a global scale. 

“We are proud to support him as a scholar, collaborator and ambassador for both UMKC and the Fulbright mission,” Hunt said.

Lightner has been studying zero fare since 2021, where he researched Kansas City’s switch to zero fare. His team found that ridership increased as well as physical activity. The research found that people were meeting their daily recommendation for physical activity just walking to and from the bus stop.

The framework for the project in Brazil is built on the work Lightner and his team performed in Kansas City. He’s excited to see how the research in Brazil will affect change in Kansas City. The work is important to Lightner because he said bus riders are a traditionally marginalized population where there are systemic issues limiting their ability to have good health.