
Biography
My research and teaching interests lie in criminology, life course studies, and stratification. I study how employment experiences relate to antisocial behavior and school achievement during adolescence and the transition to adulthood. I also study how problem behaviors in the early life course impact later health and wellbeing, educational and labor market attainment, and family formation. I have several ongoing research collaborations on how alcohol use in adolescence undermines short- and longer-term success in school, work, and intimate relationships. For instance, in two recent interdisciplinary projects focusing on the National Child Development Study (NCDS), and funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health, my colleagues and I identified risks posed by heavy alcohol use during adolescence for adult attainment, as well as demographic groups for whom heavy drinking is most harmful. More recently, with funding from the Economic and Social Research Council, we are using longitudinal data from the NCDS, the British Cohort Study, and the Millennium Cohort Study to examine critically the links between alcohol use patterns and health and well-being.
Research Interests
Social Inequality; Quantitative Methods; Criminology; Health and Life Course
Education
- Ph.D., Sociology, University of Minnesota, 2004
- B.A., Sociology, University of Minnesota, 1997