Project: Cumulative Socioeconomic Exposures, Cash Transfer Interventions, and Later-Life Cognitive Decline and Dementia Risk in a Low-Income Region of South Africa

Using HAALSI data, this study will determine how cumulative, randomized, and quasi-randomized socioeconomic exposures in mid-to-later-life affect memory decline and ADRD risk in later-life, by linking three unique population data sources in South Africa that cover a 22-year period (2000 to 2021). These contributions will provide robust evidence on ADRD etiology and will serve as sentinel findings for prevention strategies not only in sub-Saharan Africa, where there is currently little…

Project: Cognitive Function, Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Disorders in the HAALSI Cohort (HAALSI Dementia Study)

This project furthers research conducted by the HAALSI team on the social and biological risk factors for Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD) in an aging population in rural South Africa. The HAALSI Dementia Study follows a cohort of 600 participants through two additional waves of dementia diagnostic evaluation—including an enriched cognitive battery, informant interviews, and neurological examinations. Additional participants at risk for dementia are also being recruited from the…

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Social Demography Seminars

The Social Demography Seminar (SDS) series at the Center for Population and Development Studies provide a lively forum for scholars from across the university to discuss in-progress social scientific and population research. Social demography includes work that uses demographic methods to describe and explain the distribution of social goods across populations. The Social Demography Seminar series thus welcomes presentations on a wide variety of topics such as family, gender, race/ethnicity,…

Sloan Fellowship on Aging and Work

The Sloan Fellowship on Aging and Work, an interdisciplinary postdoctoral training program funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation from 2016–2022, addressed the challenges of aging societies and labor force participation. Sloan Postdoctoral Fellows on Aging and Work, along with associated Harvard faculty members, worked to address issues related to work and retirement by identifying the challenges of working longer, and the potential solutions to the ways in which the…

HAALSA letters and name of project Health and Aging in Africa: Longitudinal Studies in South Africa

Health and Aging in Africa: Longitudinal Studies in South Africa (HAALSA)

Since 2013, HCPDS’ flagship project, HAALSA, has been examining the under-studied demographic and epidemiologic transition taking place in South Africa, one of many countries whose population has experienced a boost in life expectancy thanks to the successful scale up of antiretroviral therapy (ART) in response to the HIV epidemic, as well as general socioeconomic and health care improvements. These gains in life expectancy, however, have meant that the region has…

Boston Area Work, Well-Being, and Equity Network

Boston Area Work, Well-Being, and Equity Network is a Boston-based consortium of scholars, formed in 2022, who collaborate on solutions to the problems of declining job quality and  precarious and stressful work conditions.

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“Overtime: America’s Aging Workforce and the Future of Working Longer”

“Overtime: America’s Aging Workforce and the Future of Working Longer,” a volume on aging and work published by Oxford University Press in 2022 and edited by HCPDS Director Lisa Berkman and former HCPDS Sloan Fellow Beth Truesdale, explores a challenge that many Americans are facing— and will be confronting— in the years ahead: is a delayed retirement a realistic, practical and tenable option for all of us as we attempt…

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The Shift Project

HCPDS faculty member Daniel Schneider, a sociologist and professor of public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, is co-director of The Shift Project, a research project that explores how precarious and unpredictable work schedules in the low-wage service sector affect the household economic security and well-being of workers and their families. Spearheaded in 2016 by Schneider and his colleague Kristen Harknett, The Project, which collect survey data using innovative methods—such…

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Warehouse Work, Health, and Well-Being

Warehouse Work, Health, and Well-Being is a large-scale, randomized controlled trial to test a novel participatory workplace intervention—“Health and Well-being Committees” (HaWCs)—to improve worker voice and well-being among hourly associates across multiple sites in one firm. This study focuses on workers in fulfillment centers in the e-commerce segment of the warehousing and storage industry—a growing and important industry. Warehouse workers face a double burden of physically taxing and high-strain jobs…

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Work Design for Health Employer Toolkit

The Work Design for Health Employer Toolkit, freely available on the evidence-based website Work and Well-Being Initiative (WWBI), is designed to empower employers to improve worker well-being by creating workplace conditions that foster the health and well-being of all workers in an inclusive manner. The guidance built into the toolkit is based on three core principles that serve as the foundation to numerous “promising” practices” that can be utilized by…