My recent research has focused on three substantive areas related to US health and mortality, with specific attention given to the social origins of the disease and mortality patterns we observe in the US population: 1) long-term trends in race/ethnic disparities in all-cause and cause-specific adult mortality rates, and the social, political, and economic conditions that shape these disparities, 2) the association between the US obesity epidemic and adult mortality rates, and the increasing effect that obesity has on US longevity, and 3) the long-term health effects of early-life adversity. I have also grown increasingly interested in the methodological approaches to addressing all three of these substantive areas of quantitative inquiry. As such, some of my recent work has been focused on advancing new ways to address these questions with statistical techniques.
keywords
life course, health, mortality, social demography, quantitative methods
SOCY 2061 - Introduction to Social Statistics
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2018 / Spring 2019 / Spring 2020
Introduces students to quantitative analysis of social phenomena. Emphasizes understanding and proper interpretation of graphs; measures of central tendency, dispersion, and association; and the concept of statistical significance. Assumes students have only limited mathematical background.
SOCY 4052 - Social Inequalities in Health
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2019
Focuses on social inequalities in health in both U.S. and international contexts. Reviews the link between health status and various types of social statuses, including but not limited to socioeconomic status, gender, race and ethnicity. Explanations for the relationships between these factors and various health outcomes are discussed. Focuses on multiple levels of analysis, from the physician-patient interactions to health care systems and social policies. Students have the opportunity to develop their own specific research interests in this field.
SOCY 6111 - Data 2: Data Analysis
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2018 / Fall 2019
Introduces students to mainstream multivariate regression techniques used in the social sciences. The majority of the course focuses on the Ordinary Least Square model and on the extension of this model to nominal, ordinal and count dependent variables. Students analyze data of their choosing with statistical software packages including SPSS, SAS, and STATA. Department prerequisite: SOCY 5111 or equivalent.
