Anna Gassman-Pines, Associate Professor at the Duke University Sanford School of Public Policy, will present of the effects of the Fair Workweek Ordinance (FWO) implemented by Emeryville, CA in 2017. The policy aimed to reduce workers’ schedule unpredictability by requiring large retail and food service employers to provide advanced notice of schedules and to compensate workers for last-minute schedule changes. From a sample of working parents with young children (N = 96; 50% working in regulated businesses), this study gathered daily reports of work schedule unpredictability and worker and family well-being over three waves: one prior to the implementation of the FWO, one during the early “soft launch” of the FWO, and one during the FWO’s full implementation. Results show that the FWO succeeded in decreasing schedule unpredictability that working parents experience and improved parents’ well-being. In particular, the FWO reduced instances of unexpected changes in work hours and in last-minute work-schedule changes. However, results also show that the FWO decreased parents’ average weekly work hours. This study provides the first evidence on the effect of a secure schedule policy, a new type of labor policy being implemented or considered in cities across the country, on working parents.
Jane Lee Hosts Susan Cassels for “Population Mobility and the Geography of Sex for Men who Have Sex with Men”
CSDE Affiliate Jane Lee, Assistant Professor at the School of Social Work, is hosting Susan Cassels, Associate Professor of Geography and Research Associate in the Broom Center for Demography at the University of California-Santa Barbara, for a seminar on 5/21/2019, 11:00 AM-12:30 PM. Students are welcome to join Prof. Cassels for a luncheon following the seminar, at 12:30-1:30 PM (RSVP to Chloe at clotilde@uw.edu). Lee is hosting this seminar as part of a CSDE seed grant, which can be used to convene field experts and consultants. Learn more and apply to a CSDE seed grant here!
How can geographic knowledge about mobility, sexual health and HIV risk behavior help achieve HIV prevention targets, especially for men who have sex with men (MSM) of color? This talk will present some findings from two studies of population mobility and the geography of sex: a survey of MSM in Seattle (n = 350), and a qualitative study of Latinx and African American MSM in Los Angles (n = 20). We find remarkably high age specific migration rates among MSM, but no strong evidence to suggest that recent mobility is associated with increased HIV risk behavior. Nonetheless, qualitative evidence shows distinct migration trajectories and sexual health experiences over the lifecourse for MSM living in Los Angles. This work suggests that the context of moving, as opposed to simply being mobile, may matter for defining and prioritizing HIV prevention efforts. Lastly, I discuss how a geographic perspective can continue to support HIV prevention efforts, including an emphasis on neighborhoods, activity spaces, and the geography of sex.
Cassels’s work spans many disciplines, including demography, epidemiology, and geography. Her research interests are in the areas of population health, migration, epidemic modeling, HIV/AIDS, and sexual networks. Currently, her research is focused on migration and residential mobility and its effects on sexual risk behavior, sexual network structure and HIV transmission. Cassels’s current research is on social and structural barriers to HIV care for minority and foreign-born Hispanic men who have sex with men in Southern California.
Call for Articles: RSF Issue on Wealth Inequality and Child Development
The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences is receiving articles for an issue on “Wealth Inequality and Child Development: New Evidence for Policy and Practice.” The issue will be co-edited by CSDE Affiliate Heather Hill, Associate Professor at the Evans School of Public Policy and Governance, and Christina Gibson-Davis, from Duke University. Prospective contributors should submit a CV and an abstract of their study along with supporting material by June 24, 2019.
Wealth inequality—the unequal distribution of assets and debts across a population—has reached historic levels in the United States, particularly for households with children. Among households with a resident child under the age of eighteen, the increase in wealth inequality has outpaced the rise in income inequality, and such households have higher levels of wealth inequality than other household types. To stimulate the academic and policy conversation on wealth inequality, this volume will examine the contours and consequences of wealth inequality for child households and for child outcomes. Our issue will feature original theoretical and empirical work that builds our understanding of the implications of wealth inequality for child development and offers insights into the most promising policies and programs to reduce wealth inequality and its potentially far-reaching effects.
NIH Director’s Early Independence Awards (DP5 Clinical Trial Optional)
Sponsor: NIH
Program: NIH Director’s Early Independence Awards (DP5 Clinical Trial Optional) https://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-RM-19-008.html
Program number: RFA-RM-19-008
Award amount: $1,250,000, plus F&A
Number of applications UW can put forward: 2
OR internal deadline: 5/30/19
OSP deadline: 9/4/19
Sponsor deadline: 9/13/19
Program Description
The NIH Director’s Early Independence Award supports exceptional investigators who wish to pursue independent research essentially after completion of their terminal doctoral/research degree or end of post-graduate clinical training, thereby forgoing the traditional post-doctoral training period and accelerating their entry into an independent research career. For the program to support the best possible researchers and research, applications are sought which reflect the full diversity of the research workforce. Individuals from diverse backgrounds and from the full spectrum of eligible institutions in all geographic locations are strongly encouraged to apply to this Funding Opportunity Announcement. In addition, applications in all topics relevant to the broad mission of NIH are welcome, including, but not limited to, topics in the behavioral, social, biomedical, applied, and formal sciences and topics that may involve basic, translational, or clinical research. The NIH Director’s Early Independence Award is a component of the High-Risk, High-Reward Research program of the NIH Common Fund.
Pre-proposal instructions
Please submit:
- a one-page letter of intent with a description of proposed aims and approach
- CV (not NIH format) of the PI
- A letter of support from the Dean or Chair. This letter of support signifies that the Dean or Chair have ensured that the nominee and application are likely to be of sufficient quality to be competitive nationally
to research@uw.edu by 5:00 PM Thursday May 30, 2019.Proposals are due to the sponsor 9/13/19, so you will need to have your materials in to the Office of Sponsored Programs by 9/4/19 for processing, if given the go ahead by the Proposal Review Committee. Other open limited submissions opportunities, as well as the internal proposal review committee review and selection process outline, are here: http://www.uw.edu/research/funding/limited-submissions/. Please feel free to email us at research@uw.edu with questions or information on any limited submission opportunities that should be but are not already listed on that page.
Ellie Brindle to Serve as a Biomarker Consultant for USAID Demographic and Health Surveys
CSDE’s Biodemography Director Ellie Brindle will serve as a biomarker consultant for the Demographic and Health Surveys 8th wave. Since 1984, the USAID-funded DHS Program has provided countries with technical support for implementing hundreds of household surveys in over 90 countries. USAID contracts with ICF International to implement the DHS Program with additional technical assistance from partners including PATH. Ellie provided support for biomarker protocol development, field biomarker data collection training and laboratory training for the previous wave. PATH and UW have just reached an agreement that will allow Ellie to continue to provide technical assistance in support of USAID’s plans to expand its collection of biomarker data in the 8th wave.
Ann Bostrom Gives NSF Distinguished Lecture on Perceptions and Policy Preferences to Slow or Stop Climate Change
Last week, CSDE Affiliate Ann Bostrom, Weyerhaeuser Endowed Professor in Environmental Policy at the Evans School, gave a Distinguished Lecture in the Directorate for Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences at the National Science Foundation. Bostrom discussed how the effectiveness and costs of policies to slow or stop climate change should, for a rational actor, influence policy preferences, but that research on risk perceptions and decision making suggests that emotional responses to climate change may be as or more important.
In a nationally representative survey of U.S. adults we asked people for their own ideas about how to slow or stop climate change, then their judgments of possible policy strategies. A majority supported slowing or stopping climate change by reducing carbon emissions. Respondents differentiated systematically between the ease and effectiveness of actions and assessed government policies as more effective than personal actions. However, they differentiated little between the effectiveness of possible individual actions, or between the effectiveness of diverse government policies. Even after controlling for perceived costs, knowledge, and political ideology, perceived effectiveness of policies is positively associated with policy preferences, as are perceptions of climate change as a proximate risk. Emotions such as concern and fear—but not hope—mediate the influence of these two factors on policy preferences.
Brianna Mills Finds that More Gun Injuries Happen Far From Victims’ Homes
The School Public Health recently published a story on CSDE Fellow Alumna Brianna Mills and her innovative research on firearm assault injuries by residence and injury occurrence location. The study, published in Injury Prevention, was part of Mills’ Epidemiology doctoral dissertation and was supported by CSDE’s Shanahan Fellowship.
Mills, a research scientist at the Harborview Injury Prevention & Research Center, found that nearly three-quarters of firearm injuries and deaths in King County occurred beyond the immediate area surrounding the victim’s home. The study also found that more injuries happened in certain neighborhoods to people who don’t live there than to the residents of that area.
Mills used data from the Harborview Medical Center Trauma Registry and Washington State death records to analyze 670 fatal and non-fatal firearm assault injuries that occurred in King County between 2010 and 2014. She found that the median distance between the location of injury and the individual’s address was almost 4 miles, with the greatest distance between residence and injury location seen amongst young people. Mills also discovered most missing residential addresses in these records were due to assaults on the homeless or people who live outside the county. This type of missing information introduces bias into a residential-based database because it excludes the homeless and unstably housed or it misrepresents an injury hotspot where injuries occur primarily to nonresidents.
Strengthening South Africa’s Health Policy Systems Through a Best Practices-based Policy Development Manual and Policy Information Management System, Aaron Katz & Jeff Lane (CHIPS Monthly Seminar, 6/6/2019)
Closing the know-do gap – evidence-based policy capacity in South Africa.
Three principles of data science: predictability, computability, and stability (PCS), Bin Yu (CSSS Seminar, 5/8/2019)
Bin Yu, Chancellor’s Professor, Departments of Statistics and EECS, University of California, Berkeley, statistics.berkeley.edu/~binyu
Abstract
In this talk, I’d like to discuss the intertwining importance and connections of three principles of data science in the title and the PCS workflow that is built on the three principles for a data science life cycle including problem formulation, data cleaning, EDA, modeling, post-hoc analysis and data conclusions. The principles will be demonstrated in the context of two collaborative projects in neuroscience and genomics for interpretable data results and testable hypothesis generation. If time allows, I will present proposed PCS inference that includes perturbation intervals and PCS hypothesis testing. The PCS inference uses prediction screening and takes into account both data and model perturbations. Finally, a PCS documentation is proposed based on Rmarkdown, iPython, or Jupyter Notebook, with publicly available, reproducible codes and narratives to back up human choices made throughout a data science life cycle. The PCS workflow and documentation are demonstrated in a genomics case study available on Zenodo.
Links to papers: [1] Three principles of data science: predictability, computability and stability (PCS) (https://arxiv.org/abs/1901.08152). [2] Interpretable machine learning: definitions, methods and applications (https://arxiv.org/abs/1901.04592)
Fall Course: BIOA455 Laboratory Methods in Hormones and Behavior, Dr. Melanie Martin
I’ve attached a flyer for BIOA 455, the lab methods course that I will teach in in the Biodemography Lab in Fall 2019. The course is titled ‘Laboratory Methods in Hormones and Behavior’, but is still listed in registrar under old name (Reproductive Ecology Lab Seminar, official name change did not go through yet). Please circulate among students/appropriate listservs for CSDE and the Biodemography lab.
Registration will be by add code only. There are no pre-reqs for the course, but first preference will be given to graduate students and senior undergraduate students with backgrounds and interests in lab and quantitative methods.