Jacs has a passion for Indigenous and environmental anthropology with a focus on Māori and Pacific interests and epistemologies.

Her Masters topic was particularly important to her because of her Tongan background and concern at seeing the increased levels of non-communicable diseases within her extended family. Jacinta looked at the contradictory effects that globalisation and ideas of development have on the people of Tonga, particularly in respect to their understandings of health and how they negotiate the relationship between tradition and modernity.

Jacs' PhD research relates to a larger environmental based research project on the influence of auhumoana tawhito (ancient aquaculture) on toheroa, an endemic shellfish of Aotearoa. She seeks to ethnographically describe the cultural significance of toheroa for Māori, particularly in Te Tai Tokerau, and to investigate the traditional and contemporary resource management practices associated with kaimoana.