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Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology

Xu Studies the Influence of Wording on Attitudes Towards Domestic Violence from Legislation in African Countries

CSDE Affiliate Dafeng Xu (Public Policy & Governance) recently published an article in Social Science & Medicine, titled “The Wording Matters: Gender Equality Laws and Women’s Attitudes Towards Domestic Violence in Africa“. In this paper, researchers documented the association between specific wordings regarding domestic violence within gender equality laws and women’s attitudes towards domestic violence in African countries. To do so, they used data on the longitudinal Demographic and Health Survey conducted between 2003 and 2018, and empirically conducted a difference-in-differences analysis that captures variations in the country and timing of the inclusion of specific wordings addressing domestic violence in the legislative framework that encompasses the general principle of gender equality. 

*New* Webinar on The Humanitarian Crisis in Gaza and Public Health Responses (2/26/24)

The Department of Global Health is sponsoring a special webinar on Feb 26 to discuss and describe public health responses to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. The event will be virtual and take place from 11:30-1:00PM. The goal of this webinar panel will be to provide a more detailed understanding to the UW community of the public health aspects of the crisis and the role of global health professionals addressing current and anticipated health needs of the population. Learn more on the event page and register on Zoom here.

The crisis has become what relief agencies and global health specialists call a “Complex Humanitarian Emergency” or CHE, in which war or natural disaster destroy community infrastructure leading to mass displacement combined with lack of basic services and access to basic needs. CHEs are characterized by extremely high levels of civilian mortality, mass population dislocation, malnutrition, and disease. Since October 2023, nearly 30,000 Gazans, mostly women and children, have been killed and nearly 2 million have been displaced. But public health officials warn that many more lives are threatened now from malnutrition and infectious disease outbreaks common to CHEs in displaced populations without access to food, water, shelter, or medical services. Dozens of International relief agencies and UN organizations have been struggling  to provide support and services amidst ongoing fighting. Many of these agencies have been outspoken about the unusually intense and enormous scale of the humanitarian catastrophe. The longer term consequences of the crisis will eventually require a massive rebuilding effort that includes reconstruction of a destroyed health infrastructure as well as basic infrastructure, housing, schools and other institutions for community recuperation.

  • Aisha Jumaan (Yemen Relief and Construction Foundation)
  • Zeena Salman (Palestine Children’s Relief Fund)
  • Yara Asi (Palestinian academic and author of recent book on war and health in the region)
  • Dhabie Brown (Norwegian Refugee Council)
  • Len Rubenstein (Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health, and Director of Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition)

Please register here: https://washington.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_nQjiWDAbRRG2Bx1vCljf0Q#/registration

*New* JSDE Seminar: Transportation, Gentrification, and Urban Mobility: The Inequality Effects of Place-Based Policies (2/26/24)

Melanie Morten (Stanford) will be presenting in the Joint Seminar in Development Economics. The seminar will take place Monday, February 26 from 11 am to 12:30 pm in person in Savery 410 and on Zoom (link). Morten will discuss place-based policies to transportation and how they affect the poor. Learn more in the full story.

Title:  Transportation, Gentrification, and Urban Mobility: The Inequality Effects of Place-Based Policies
Co-Authors: Clare Balboni, Gharad Bryan, Bilal Siddiqi
Abstract: Roads, rail, and other public transport in a city are “place-based,” in that they are built in specific neighborhoods. Do such investments benefit the poor? If people are mobile within a city, then any such place-based investment can lead to neighborhood changes, such as rent increases, which change who can afford to live near these investments and hence who benefits from them. Using original panel data (tracked on two dimensions: (i) following households if they move, and (ii) surveying all new residents of buildings) we collected in Dar es Salaam, we study the distributional effects of Dar es Salaam’s nascent BRT system.

ICPSR Summer Program Now Accepting Scholarship Applications (Due 2/26/24)

The ICPSR Summer Program in Quantitative Methods is now accepting scholarship applications for its 2024 Program, which will take place throughout summer 2024. These scholarships provide registration fee waivers for their General Sessions, a comprehensive methods training program comprising more than 40 courses and lectures, including intro stats, MLE, machine learning, SEM, longitudinal and panel data analysis, theoretical modeling, Bayes, and more. All General Session courses are offered in-person (on the University of Michigan campus in Ann Arbor) and online. The scholarship application deadline is Monday, February 26, 2024. Application for the program, itself, will open Feb. 7th.

CSSS Seminar with Donald Chi: Sugared fruit drinks as a sociobehavioral determinant of health in Alaska Native communities (2/28/24)

CSSS will host CSDE Affiliate Donald Chi on Wednesday, Feb. 28th at 12:30 in 409 Savery Hall and on Zoom (register here). Donald L. Chi is professor and the Lloyd and Kay Chapman Endowed Chair of Oral Health at the University of Washington School of Dentistry (Seattle, USA) and is Associate Dean for Research. Dr. Chi is Co-Director of the NIH-funded T90/R90 training grant. He is dual board-certified in pediatric dentistry and dental public health. His research program focuses on understanding the causes of oral health inequities and addressing them through community-based behavioral interventions and evidence-based policies. He received the 2017 IADR Distinguished Scientist Award and was named Pediatric Dentist of the Year by the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry in 2018. Dr. Chi is Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Paediatric Dentistry. He teaches public health and provides dental care as a staff pediatric dentist at the Odessa Brown Children’s Clinic in Seattle. Read more about the talk here!

Evans Seminar: Dr. LaTonya Trotter on Reimagining Care from Nurses’ Perspective (2/28/24)

CSDE Affiliate Dr. LaTonya Trotter (Department of Bioethics and Humanities) will present at the Evans seminar on Wednesday, Feb 28th from 11:30-12:30pm in 360 Parrington Hall. Dr. Trotter’s talk is titled “Reimagining Care: The Pandemic’s Impact on What it Means to be a ‘Good Nurse'”. While many have documented the pandemic’s impact on worker turnover and labor shortages, few have considered the change it may engender for providers and their practices. In this talk, Dr. Trotter will use the experiences of registered nurses to consider the ways in which pandemic experiences were more than an acute stressor, but may portend changed understandings of what it means to be a nurse in terms of crafting a nursing a career and balancing competing obligations in the pursuit of being “a good nurse.”

Opportunity for funding: French-American Research Collaborations Related to the SDGs (Due 2/29/24)

The Transatlantic Research Partnership aims to encourage innovative research and new collaborations that enrich French-American collaborations, with a view to supporting projects involving young researchers (post-docs, PhDs). Designed to foster forward-looking collaborative research that addresses pressing global challenges, the program supports projects related to one or more United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Selected projects will receive a $20,000 grant, to be shared equally between the French and the American partners over 2 years. These funds will support transatlantic mobility of researchers, collaborative research activities such as the organization of international workshops or conferences, and the production of joint publications. The application deadline is February 29, 2024.