“Overtime” makes Princeton’s short list of Noteworthy Books in 2022

Overtime Book cover with screen shot of Princeton's list of noteworthy books in 2022

“Overtime: America’s Aging Workforce and the Future of Working Longer,” a volume co-edited by HCPDS Director Lisa Berkman and former Sloan Fellow on Aging and Work Beth C. Truesdale featuring 30 contributing interdisciplinary researchers has been named one of 11 Noteworthy Books in 2022 by Princeton University’s Industrial Relations section in the area of industrial relations and labor economics.

Study links changes in work environment with reduced risk of cardiovascular disease among most at-risk employees

Graph showing greater protection of risk for those at higher cardiometabolic risk

A reduction in stressful conditions at work has now been linked to a reduction in cardiovascular disease (CVD) among those employees who were at an elevated risk of CVD at the start of the intervention study, especially if they were older workers. Researchers affiliated with The Work, Family & Health Network Study deployed interventions at two different types of works sites (IT and long-term care) designed to increase work-life balance…

Call for Applications: The Sissela Bok Ethics and Population Research Prize

Head shot of Sisslea Bok

We are pleased to announce that the call for applications is now open for the Sissela Bok Ethics and Population Research Prize. The $5,000 prize will be awarded to a doctoral student, postdoctoral fellow, or full-time, untenured faculty member at Harvard who has incorporated ethical considerations into his/her population science research. The deadline to apply is Friday, December 8, 2023.            

What’s to blame for the lagging U.S life expectancy? A closer look at mid-life ‘deaths of despair’ and retirement-age chronic disease

Head shot of Leah Abrams

Recent Sloan Fellow on Aging and Work Leah Abrams, PhD, is lead author on A Brief Report published in PNAS Demography that explores what could be driving the troubling status of U.S. life expectancy which has been stagnating since 2010. Abrams and her colleagues find chronic disease at the time of retirement to be a bigger factor than the ‘deaths of despair’ (drug overdose, alcohol abuse, and suicide) that have…

Comment: “Prosociality should be a public health priority”

Head shot of Laura Kubzansky from 2023

With poignant lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic fresh in our minds, faculty member Laura Kubzansky, PhD, corresponding author on a Comment published in Nature Human Behavior, makes a strong case for why prosociality (defined as positive other-regarding behaviors and beliefs) should be more deeply explored—with a sense of urgency—as part of an ‘asset-based’ approach to address the rising rates of hopelessness, despair, and poor mental health in the U.S.

CALL FOR APPLICATIONS: Recruiting now for interdisciplinary postdoctoral fellowships at Harvard Population Center

Collage of photos of postdoctoral fellows with Call for applications for fellowships

The Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies is now accepting applications for its postdoctoral fellowship program—the David E. Bell Fellowship for the 2024–2026 cohort. We offer competitive salaries, benefits, and research/travel funds. Deadline to apply is Thursday, November 30, 2023.      

“Climate change is poised to have enduring and far-reaching consequences on the Sustainable Development Goals related to health”

Sustainable Development Goals 2030

S (Subu) V Subramanian explains in this piece in Mongabay-India  how climate change has a negative impact on India’s progress in achieving the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. A study led by Subramanian that was published in The Lancet Regional Health Southeast Asia earlier this year that assessed India’s progress in meeting these goals is also cited in this article.

Beckfield leads interdisciplinary faculty and graduate student retreat to develop undergraduate environmental justice curriculum

Jason Beckfield leads a retreat at Wood's Hole on environmental justice

HCPDS Associate Director Jason Beckfield, PhD, led the first of three pilot retreats aimed at developing undergraduate curriculum in the “emerging field of environmental justice, or the convergence of environmental concerns with equity and civil rights” in response to the 2022 Report on the Future of Climate Education at Harvard University. Read about the retreat that took place at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute in The Harvard Gazette. Photo credit:…

Cross and Pedulla share ASA award for their work to advance the field of family sociology

Cross and Pedulla share award for most impactful paper from ASA

HCPDS faculty members Christina Cross and David Pedulla were both recognized by the American Sociological Association (ASA) with the ASA Family Section’s 2023 Article of the Year Award for their independent journal articles published last year. Cross, a former postdoctoral fellow at HCPDS and current member of the Social Demography Seminar planning committee at the Center, was recognized for a paper that continues her previous scholarship on two-parent families by…