Valerie Mueller, School of Politics and Global Studies, Arizona State University

Internal migration has the potential to substantially increase income, especially for the poor in developing countries, and yet migration rates remain low. We explore the role of psychic costs by evaluating the impacts of internal migration on a suite of well-being indicators using a unique, 22-year longitudinal study in rural Pakistan. 

The deadline to apply for CSDE’s Lightning Talks and Poster Presentation Session has been extended to October 20th! The event will take place on December 1, and is a great opportunity to practice presenting your research and receive feedback from an interdisciplinary set of scholars.

Eight applicants will be chosen to present a poster of their research and give a short (~2 minute) presentation of their work to CSDE students and faculty. Students at any stage in the research process are welcome to apply.

Janelle S. Taylor, affiliate and Professor in the Department of Anthropology, has received funding from the National Institute on Aging (NIA) for a new study titled “Health Outcomes for Patients with Dementia without Family Caregivers.”  This two-year R21 project includes both quantitative and qualitative components, and will be a collaboration between Taylor as PI and colleagues from Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute, the VA Puget Sound Health Care System, various UW departments, and CSDE. 

In a recent article, CSDE Biodemography Lab Manager Eleanor Brindle and colleagues present a technique to address the issue of limited information on the status micronutrient deficiencies in the populations of low- and middle-income countries. The micronutrients of concern to the authors are vitamin A, iron, and iodine, deficiencies of which are public health concerns in a number of low- and middle-income nations. Lead author Brindle and her co-authors developed a 7-plex immunoassay that enables the concurrent measurement of seven biomarkers used to determine the status of these micronutrients in populations of concern.

In an article published last week in Population and Development Review, CSDE Training Director Emilio Zagheni and co-authors present Facebook’s advertising platform as a novel strategy for estimating migration data. Facebook provides a free and accessible means for researchers and advertisers alike to find relevant socio-demographic information about users, which they can then sort by geographic location. Considering the dearth of data sources available for assessing progress towards goals such as sustainable development, this approach—which takes advantage of new data sources—is an important development for demographic research.