Many detrimental health outcomes are preventable through behavior change and shifts in our mindsets and attitudes. Our division does research that increases our understanding of the behavioral, psychological and social-interpersonal processes that impact important health outcomes such as disease prevention, healthy child development, healthy aging and longevity."
Dan Mroczek, PhD
Division Chief, Determinants of Health
The Determinants of Health Division investigates how psychological, social, developmental, biological and behavioral processes influence health and disease outcomes. This foundational research informs the development and implementation of future interventions. Our division includes experts in research methods, data modeling, statistical techniques and research design.
Key areas of expertise include:
- Personality and health
- Developmental psychopathology
- Aging
- Brain health and dementia
- Physical heath in sexual and gender minority populations
- Health disparities
- Cancer survivorship
- Neuroscience
Research Programs & Labs
Lauren Wakschlag, PhD How early development shapes mental health
As a developmental and clinical psychologist, Wakschlag's scientific focus is on how early development (from the prenatal-preschool period) shapes mental health pathways.
For more information see Wakschlag's faculty profile or the Institute of Developmental Science (DevSci) website.
Elizabeth Johnson, PhD | Dynamic Brain Lab Brain dynamics and information processing
We study the brain dynamics underlying information encoding, retrieval, and use across the human lifespan, from neurons to large-scale networks.
For more information see Johnson's faculty profile or the Dynamic Brain Lab website.
Michelle Birkett, PhD Using data science to study health inequities
Using data science to study health inequities
Birkett is a transdisciplinary scientist who uniquely and effectively bridges social science, population health and data science. Her program improves population health by developing and applying novel network, quantitative, and computational methods to measure the social and structural drivers of health, particularly the health inequities experienced by racial, ethnic, and sexual and gender minority populations.
She also leads a team which is currently revolutionizing the ability for scientists to capture social network survey data. Their software, Network Canvas, is a free and open-source NIH-supported tool which is already being utilized by a broad research community across the world.
She serves as the Director of the CONNECT Complex Systems and Health Disparities Research Program under the Institute of Sexual and Gender Minority Health and Wellbeing, as a faculty affiliate of Institute for Policy Research, and as a core faculty member of The Northwestern Institute on Complex Systems.
For more information see Birkett's faculty profile, the Network Canvas, or I.AIM.