Friday, May 16, 2008
8:00 A.M. ? 4:30 P.M.
University Club of Chicago
76 East Monroe Street | Chicago, IL 60603
Emma Adam is an Associate Professor of Human Development and Social Policy and a Faculty Fellow at the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University. Adam is a developmental psychologist and has been with Northwestern?s School of Education and Social Policy since 2000. She is interested in how everyday life
factors such as work, school, and family relationships influence levels of stress, health, and well-being in parents and their children. She is trying to trace the pathways by which stress ?gets under the skin? to contribute to poor health and affect children?s behavioral, academic, and emotional development. By using non-invasive methods such as measurement of the stress-sensitive hormone cortisol, she is studying how children and parents react to stress, as well as exploring how adolescents? daily experiences, stress hormone regulation, and sleep habits influence their risk for the development of depression and anxiety disorders as they become adults.
Kristen Jacobson is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Chicago. Dr. Jacobson is the Associate Director of Twin Studies at the University of Chicago and is also working on developing her own twin-family project using families from the Chicago area. In addition, Dr. Jacobson has access to data
from a number of outstanding twin and family studies, and collaborates with other twin researchers around the world, including investigators from the University of Southern California , the Virginia Commonwealth University , the University of California at San Diego , Boston University , and the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. Although her primary interests are in how biology, genes, and environments interact in the development of antisocial behavior, Dr. Jacobson is also actively involved in studies investigating genetic and environmental influences on substance use disorders, personality disorders, and health, cognition and aging. Her research is supported largely through grants from the NIH, including a Mentored Scientist Career Development award from NIMH.
Thomas McDade is an Associate Professor of Anthropology, Weinberg College Board of Visitors Research and Teaching Professor, and Faculty Fellow at the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University. McDade is a biological anthropologist who conducts research on health and human development in relation to social
and cultural contexts and processes. Much of this work focuses on the health impact of psychosocial stress, and the integration of biological measures into population-based, social science research. He is director of the Laboratory for Human Biology Research, and associate director of Cells to Society (C2S): The Center on Social Disparities and Health.
Ofer Malamud is an Assistant Professor at the Harris School of Public Policy Studies at the University of Chicago. Malamud primarily conducts research in the fields of labor economics and education economics. His recent work focuses on the labor market outcomes associated with general and specific education. In particular,
he has examined the relative returns to general and vocational education in Romania and the trade-off between early specialization and the gains from delaying the choice of a major field of study in Britain. He has also studied the effect of education on regional mobility using the unintended effect of attending college to avoid the Vietnam draft.
Ioana Marinescu is an Assistant Professor at the Harris School of Public Policy Studies at the University of Chicago. Marinescu has broad interests in the areas of labor and public economics. Her work focuses on the effect of institutions and policies on economic outcomes. She studies how labor market regulations such
as firing restrictions affect workers' outcomes on the labor market and firms' human resources management. She also works with Philippe Aghion from Harvard University to analyze the impact of cyclical budgetary policies on economic growth.
Rebecca Ryan is a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Human Potential and Public Policy. Ryan earned her PhD in Developmental Psychology from Columbia University. Her dissertation examined the moderating effect of fathers' economic and socioemotional resources on the associations between family
structure and early child behavioral and cognitive development. Rebecca is a recipient of the Ruth L. Kirchstein National Research Service Award from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), which supports her research on cohabitation, child wellbeing, and parental investments in children.
Matthew W. Stagner is Executive Director of Chapin Hall and a Senior Lecturer at the Irving B. Harris School of Public Policy Studies at the University of Chicago. Prior to joining Chapin Hall, Dr. Stagner directed the Center on Labor, Human Services, and Population at the Urban Institute in Washington, D.C. He also served as Director of
the Division of Children and Youth Policy, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. He has directed research for the National Research Council and the Center for the Study of Social Policy as well.
Dr. Stagner is an expert on youth risk behaviors, child welfare services, and program evaluation. He is conducting research on the effectiveness of programs for children aging out of foster care. Dr. Stagner holds a Ph.D. from the Harris School of Public Policy Studies at the University of Chicago and a Masters in Public Policy from Harvard University?s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
