CSDE Affiliate Francisca Santana (Environmental and Forest Sciences) and co-authors highlighted the mental health risks facing wildfire researchers in a recent forum piece in Fire Ecology. Mental health risks include direct and secondary trauma compounded by climate anxiety and ecological grief. Drawing on their own experiences conducting interdisciplinary, community-engaged research in western North America, Santana and co-authors synthesize actionable recommendations for individual researchers, supervisors, and institutions to support researcher wellbeing.

Motivated by intersectionality theory and building on existing research, CSDE External Affiliate Callie Burt (Georgia State University) and Caitlin Dorsch used data from the National Crime Victimization Survey to examine heterogeneity in violent victimization rates among LGBT subgroups compared to non-LGBT counterparts. Rates of violent victimization are highest for bisexual individuals, followed by transgender, lesbian/gay, and non-LGBT individuals. Sociodemographic differences explain between 15% and 41% of disparities depending on subgroup, leaving the bulk unexplained.

In a recent article published in Frontiers in Public Health, CSDE Affiliate Kris Pui Kwan Ma (Family Medicine) and her colleagues examined how financial concerns affected psychological distress among Asian American adults, and whether benefit finding (a cognitive appraisal and behavioral adaptation process) and received pay (i.e., work for pay/profits or receive financial assistance) moderated this relationship. Using survey data from the 2021 Asian American and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander COVID-19 Needs Assessment Project,

CSDE Affiliate Hyungmin Cha (Sociology) recently published research on how childhood state education quality shapes the risk of cognitive impairment in mid-to-later life in Alzheimer’s & Dementia: Behavior & Socioeconomics of Aging. Cha and co-authors linked data from the 2000–2020 Health and Retirement Study to historical records on state public education systems. Greater state-level educational resources, indicative of educational quality, were associated with a decreased risk of cognitive impairment, with or without dementia,

In a new article in Social Science & Medicine, CSDE External Affiliate Kim Korinek (University of Utah) used data from the Vietnam Health and Aging Study and adopted a family resource model to examine the relationship between living arrangements and cognitive functioning among older adults and to ascertain the mediating role of material and psychosocial pathways. Older adults living alone show the poorest cognitive functioning relative to those living with both a spouse and children,

CSDE Affiliate Avanti Adhia (Nursing, Epidemiology), CSDE Affiliate Heather Hill (Evans School of Public Policy and Governance), and CSDE Trainee Ann Richey (Epidemiology), along with Krista Neumann, authored a “Current Issues” piece in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine outlining three state policy tools — paid family and medical leave, sick leave, and victim leave — that provide workers time off to address domestic violence (DV)-related legal,

CSDE External Affiliate Mick Cunningham (Western Washington University) published a study in the Journal of Family Violence examining cumulative consequences of intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization over the life course by gender and sexual orientation, using data from the U.S. National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey. Women and sexual minorities experience IPV consequences — including fear, post-traumatic stress, injury, and missed work or school — at younger ages than straight men.

The Dog Aging Project, whose Data and Analysis Core is headed up by CSDE Research Scientist Matthew D. Dunbar, PhD, was recently spotlighted on the CBS news program 60 Minutes: “Research to help dogs live longer, healthier lives could unlock secrets for people to age better, too”

Why study aging in dogs? Companion dogs share genetic diversity, environmental exposures, and cognitive traits with humans. Dogs vary tremendously not only in size,

CSDE Affiliates Katarina Guttmannova (Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences) and Griselda Martinez (Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences) assessed the Communities That Care Brief Depression Scale (CTC-BDS) for measurement equivalence across Latinx and white youth by immigrant generation status, using confirmatory factor analysis of survey data collected across sixth, eighth, tenth, and twelfth grades. The study, published in Journal of Community Psychology, found evidence for both the one-factor structure and measurement equivalence of the CTC-BDS across ethnicity,

CSDE External Affiliate Elizabeth Hirsh (University of British Columbia) published a study in the International Journal of Comparative Sociology with collaborator, Erica Mildner (PhD student, University of British Columbia), examining individual support for government-provided childcare across 26 countries, using data from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP). Household-level dynamics, particularly the “dual load” of both partners working full-time or overtime, are key predictors of support for government childcare.