Mission Statement

Our department’s program in health, population and life course provides students the theoretical and methodological tools to examine the complex linkages between macrosocial phenomena and individual-level experiences. Through course work, independent research, collaborative research with faculty, and symposia featuring renowned scholars, students develop an understanding of the many ways in which macro-level structural and temporal processes, and cultural belief systems affect individual-level social, psychological, and physical outcomes. This area combines two traditional fields of strength at Rutgers: health research and life course studies, with a new emphasis on population studies. Medical sociology has long been an area of strength at Rutgers University since the late 1970s when David Mechanic established the Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research (IHHCPAR). IHHCPAR houses an NIMH funded postdoctoral program in mental health research, and an undergraduate summer program on health research (Project Learn).

The life course area also has a long tradition, originating at Rutgers during the 1960s. One of the major paradigms in this area, the age stratification model, was developed at Rutgers by Matilda White Riley, Anne Foner, and others. A number of currently funded longitudinal research projects focus on various stages of the life course. Deborah Carr, Julie Phillips, and Kristen Springer are social demographers, creating expertise in population studies that complements the traditional strengths in medical sociology and the life course. The last external review of the Department of Sociology noted that the Rutgers program is possibly the strongest program in health and aging in the country. A recent history of medical sociology also notes that the Rutgers program has been the most successful medical sociology program in the country.

Affiliated Faculty

Deborah Carr is a life course sociologist whose research focuses on the ways that macrosocial changes affect individual-level health and well-being. Her recent studies focus on the psychosocial consequences of obesity and weight change; the ways that psychological, couple-level, and death context characteristics shape the bereavement experiences of older widows and widowers; and the psychological consequences of work and family roles across the life course and across different birth cohorts. She is currently the principal investigator of two National Institute of Aging-funded studies of end-of-life plans and preparations among older adults and their families. One study focuses on healthy, community-dwelling white older adults in Wisconsin; the other focuses on terminally ill white, black, and Latino older adults in New Jersey. Her research has appeared in journals including Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences, Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Journal of Marriage and Family, Social Psychology Quarterly, and Sociological Methodology. She is the co-editor of Spousal Bereavement in Late Life (Springer, 2007) and editor in chief of the Encyclopedia of the Life Course and Human Development (Cengage, 2009).

Steven Hansell has research interests in medical sociology, the social psychology of illness behavior, and social support networks.  Current projects focus on the effects of managed care on treatment outcomes for mentally ill children and adolescents.  Dr. Hansell is also the Director of the Undergraduate Program in the Department of Sociology.

Allan V. Horwitz does work related to the social construction of psychiatric diagnosis. His 2002 book, Creating Mental Illness, examines the social forces behind the development of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-III) of the American Psychiatric Association. It won the best publication award of the Mental Health Section of the American Sociological Association. His next major project examines how this manual defines Major Depressive Disorder and critique's this definition from an evolutionary perspective. His book on this topic, The Loss of Sadness: How Psychiatry Transformed Normal Misery into Depressive Disorder (with Jerome Wakefield), won the Best Book Award from the Association of American Publishers in the Psychology category. His forthcoming book, Diagnosis, Therapy, and Evidence: Conundrums in Modern American Medicine (with Gerald Grob), examines the social factors underlying the psychiatric construction of anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder. His current project explores the reasons behind why anxiety, the most common mental health condition in the 1950s and 1960s, was transformed into depression, the most common mental health condition in recent decades.

Ellen Idler taught at Rutgers University from 1985 to 2009, in the Department of Sociology and the Institute for Health, Health Care Policy, and Aging Research.  She studies the influence of attitudes, beliefs, and social connections on health, particularly in aging populations.  One area of her work investigates the strong association of an individual’s perception of health with subsequent disability and mortality. She also studies the impact of individual and group religious participation on the health, mortality, and timing of death among the elderly.  Other current research with Rutgers colleagues includes the impact of marital status on outcomes following heart surgery, ratings of health in the context of primary care, the role of religion in end of life decision-making, and cohort, aging, and period effects on changing suicide rates in midlife.  She is a Fellow and the current past chair of the Behavioral and Social Sciences Section of the Gerontological Society of America.  

Joanna Kempner's research investigates the intersection of medicine, science, politics, gender and the body. She is currently writing a book on the sociology of headache medicine that examines the gendered social values embedded in the way we talk about, understand, and make policies for people in pain. In other work, she is studying how the political controversies generated by health research shape scientific research agendas. Prior to joining the department, Professor Kempner was a postdoctoral fellow in the Robert Wood Johnson Scholars in Health Policy Research Program at the University of Michigan from 2004-2006 and a Research Associate at the Center for Health and Wellbeing at Princeton University from 2006-2008.

Catherine Lee's interests include the examination of racial conceptualization in biomedical research, the regulation of racial classificatory schemes for research purposes by the National Institutes of Health and the Food and Drug Administration, and the use of genetics and other biometric information in immigration control. She is working on a book on family reunification and immigration policy and an edited volume (with Keith Wailoo and Mia Bay of history and Alondra Nelson of Columbia's sociology) titled Genetics and the Unsettled Past: The Collision between DNA, Race, and History

David Mechanic is the René Dubos University Professor of Behavioral Sciences and Director of the Institute for Health, Health Care Policy, and Aging Research at Rutgers University. His research and writing deal with social aspects of health and health care. He serves as the Director of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's National Health Policy Investigator's Program. Dr. Mechanic is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Institute of Medicine. David Mechanic has received many awards including the American Sociological Association's Distinguished Career Award for the Practice of Sociology, Health Services Research Prize from the Association of University Programs in Health Administration and the Baxter Allegiance Foundation, the Distinguished Investigator Award from Academy Health, the First Carl Taube Award for Distinguished Contributions to Mental Health Services Research and the Rema Lapouse Award for Scientific Contributions to the Epidemiology and Control of Mental Illness from the American Public Health Association, and the Distinguished Medical Sociologist Award and Lifetime Contributions Award in Mental Health from the American Sociological Association. He was also selected for the first Annual Matilda Riley Award and Lecture by the National Institutes of Health. He has been a Guggenheim Fellow and Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in The Behavioral Sciences at Stanford.

Julie Phillips is a social demographer whose research focuses on the causes and consequences of various forms of social inequality, such as violent crime, marital disruption, and migration.  Her current project extends prior work on homicide to examine another form of lethal violence, namely suicide.  With funding from the American Foundation for the Prevention of Suicide, she is exploring how and why patterns of U.S. suicide rates vary across place, time, and demographic groups, with particular attention to the role of rising antidepressant drug usage rates among other demographic, socioeconomic, and behavioral factors.  In collaboration with colleagues, Dr. Phillips is embarking on a larger study that attempts to understand factors that explain consistencies and inconsistencies in suicide across the life course, with an emphasis on Baby Boomers.

Sarah Rosenfield teaches courses in mental health, the self, gender, and writing.  In addition to sociology, she studied psychiatric epidemiology at Columbia University and psychosocial epidemiology at Yale University. Her work focuses on gender, racial/ethnic and social class differences in mental health, both in internalizing problems like depression and anxiety and in externalizing problems like substance abuse and anti-social behavior. She examines cultural schemas as explanations for the often paradoxical differences between these groups. She also studies the impact of stigma on the life chances and quality of life of people with severe mental illness, as well as the effectiveness of services to improve these outcomes.  A third area investigates contradictory results in studies of race/ethnicity and mental health, which questions the ways we study mental health and whether we can believe studies comparing diverse groups. 

Kristen Springer’s research centers on health and aging in the context of gender relations and families.  She is particularly interested in examining health as a fundamental and sensitive indicator of gender inequality.  Her work emphasizes understanding possible causal mechanisms, both proximate and distal, that link social and structural factors to health inequalities.  Professor Springer is also dedicated to choosing methodological techniques, qualitative or quantitative, that best fit specific research questions. She is currently engaged in three broad research projects: 1) the gendered health effect of marital income across the life course, 2) the influence of masculinity ideals on men’s healthcare seeking behaviors dependent on socioeconomic status, and 3) the interactive influence of biology and social environment for understanding gendered health.  She has published research multiple peer-reviewed journals including American Journal of Sociology, American Journal of Public Health, Journal of General Internal Medicine, Journal of Family Issues, Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, Social Science & Medicine, Social Science Research, and Sociological Forum.  Professor Springer’s research has also been featured in national and international news sources including ABC News, LA Times, The New York Times, US News & World Report, and USA Today.

Helene White studies the causes, consequences, and comorbidity of substance use and other problem behaviors, including crime, violence, and mental illnesses. Her research concentrates primarily on transitions from adolescence into young adulthood. She also develops, implements, and evaluates brief substance use interventions for college students. Dr. White is currently principal investigator on a study funded by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism to examine the developmental associations between heavy drinking and violence and co-investigator on several projects funded by the NJ Department of Addictions to study individual and environmental interventions for reducing substance use on college campuses. She has won several awards, including the Senior Researcher Awards from the American Sociological Association Section on Alcohol Drugs and Tobacco.  Dr. White has a joint appointment with the Rutgers Center of Alcohol Studies.

Ben Zablocki’s interests include the sociology of religion, community, the social psychology of influence and charisma, the sociology of the adult life course, and the relationship between believing and belonging over time.  His publications include: The Joyful Community, Alienation and Charisma, and Misunderstanding Cults.  His research has also appeared in journals including: The Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Nova Religio, The Annual Review of Sociology, and The Journal of Applied Behavioral Science.  His current projects include: a longitudinal study of the transformation of idealism from youth to middle age, a study of the vicissitudes of the discipleship relationship over time, and a study of the systematic regularities in the births and early years of new religious movements.  His research has been generously funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, the Russell Sage Foundation, the National Science Foundation, the National Institute on Drug Abuse, and the Templeton Foundation. Professor Zablocki is also the principal investigator of the Urban Communes Data Set.  This includes what is probably one of the largest existing sets of longitudinal network data from naturally occurring groups of adults available for sociological research.

Graduate Courses Taught in the Core Area

Sociology of Health and Illness
Sociology of Mental Health
Sociology of the Life Course
Sociology of Age
Social Structure and Personality
Sociology and the Life Course
Social Psychology
Social Demography
Proseminar in Demography and Health

Recent and In Progress Dissertations  in Health, Population and the Life Course

Dawne Mouzon. In progress. Using Intersectionality to Understand Racial Differences in Mental Health: The Roles of Social Ties and Goal-Striving Stress.
Stephen Fichter. 2008. Shepherding in "Greener" Pastures:  Causes and Consequences of the Dual Transition of Celibate Catholic Priests into Married Protestant Ministry.
Jenna Howard. 2008 Recovery from Recovery: The Temporal Organization of Identity.
Karen Jaffe. 2008. Forming Fat Identities.
Ruth Simpson. 2006. The Germ Culture:  Modernity, Metaphor, and Epidemic Disease.
John Lang. 2007. "Acceptable Trust? The Public Perception of Organizations Involved in Genetically Modified Food."
Courtney Jackson. 2005. Attending Birth: Interprofessional Competition Between Midwives and Physicians.
Anna Looney. 2005. New Perspectives on Past Commitments:  Midlife Reflections on Cult Experience in Young Adulthood.
Julie McLaughlin. 2004. "It's in the Timing: The Relationship Between the Temporal Composition of Family Transitions and Psychological Well-Being."
Marsha Rosenthal. 2004. "Older Patients' Trust and Disrupted Trust in Doctors and Health Plans: Determinants and Implications.”
Elaine Replogle. 2004. "Intergenerational Conflict, Identity and Mental Health Among Second Generation South Asian Americans."
Tami Videon. 2002. "Parental Marital Dissolution, Parent-Child Interactions, and Adolescent Well-Being."
Ping-Hsin Chen. 2001. "The Role of Alcohol Use in Intimate Partner Violence among Men and Women."
Donna McAlpine. 2001. "Trust in Primary Care Physicians: Does Managed Care Matter?"
Amy Tiedemann. 2001. "Poverty, Culture and Parent: Head Start Mothers' Parental Identities."

Selected Faculty Publications

Deborah Carr
Carr, Deborah (Ed.). 2009. Encyclopedia of the Life Course and Human Development (with associate editors Robert Crosnoe, M. E. Hughes, and Amy Pienta). Farmington Hills MI: Gale/CENGAGE Learning.
Carr, Deborah. 2009. “Who’s to Blame? Perceived Responsibility for Spouse’s Death and Psychological Distress among Older Widowed Persons.” Journal of Health and Social Behavior 59: 359-375.
Carr, Deborah and Kathrin Boerner. 2009 “Do Spousal Discrepancies in Marital Quality Assessments Affect Psychological Adjustment to Widowhood?” Journal of Marriage and Family 71: 495-509.
Carr, Deborah, Karen Jaffe and Michael Friedman. 2008. “Perceived Mistreatment among Obese Americans: Do Race, Class, and Gender Matter?” Obesity 16 (Supplement): S60-68.
Carr, Deborah and Dmitry Khodyakov. 2007. “End of Life Health Care Planning among Young-Old Adults: An Assessment of Psychosocial Influences.” Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences 62B: 135-141.

Steven Hansell
Hansell, Stephen. 1997. "Treatment for Comorbid Schizophrenia and Substance Abuse Disorders." Pp. 65-74 in Improving Inpatient Psychiatric Treatment in an Era of Managed Care, edited by David Mechanic. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
White, Helene Raskin, and Stephen Hansell. 1998. "Acute and Long-Term Effects of Drug Use on Aggression from Adolescence into Adulthood." Journal of Drug Issues 28:837-858.
Hansell, Stephen, Helene Raskin White, and Firoozeh Molaparastali. 1999. "Specific Alcoholic Beverages and Physical and Mental Health among Adolescents." Journal of Studies on
Alcohol 60:209- 218.
Walkup, James, Donna McAlpine, Mark Olfson, Larissa Labay, Carol Boyer, and Stephen Hansell. 2000. "Patients with Schizophrenia at Risk for Excessive Antipsychotic Dosing."Journal of Clinical Psychiatry 61:344-348.
Olfson, Mark, David Mechanic, Stephen Hansell, Carol Boyer,James Walkup, and Peter Weiden. 2000. "Predicting Medication Noncompliance in After Hospital Discharge among Patients with Schizophrenia." Psychiatric Services 51:216- 222.

Allan Horwitz
Gerald N. Grob and Allan V. Horwitz. Diagnosis, Therapy, and Evidence: Conundrums in Modern American Medicine. Rutgers University Press. Forthcoming December 2009.
Allan V. Horwitz. In Press. “An Overview of Sociological Perspectives on the Definitions, Causes, and Responses to Mental Health and Illness.” In Handbook for the Study of Mental Health: Social Contexts, Theories, and Systems, 2nd edition, edited by Teresa Scheid and Tony Brown. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Allan V. Horwitz. 2009. “The Problem That Has No Name” (review essay). New England Journal of Medicine, 360, February 19, pp. 841-849.
Allan V. Horwitz and Jerome C. Wakefield. 2009. “Should Screening for Depression Among Children and Adolescents Be Demedicalized?” Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, V. 48 (7), pp. 683-687.
Sara Shostak, Peter Conrad, and Allan Horwitz. 2008. “Sequencing and Its Consequences:  Path Dependence and the Relationships Between Genetics and Medicalization.”  American Journal of Sociology, 114 (Suppl), S287-S316.
Allan V. Horwitz and Jerome C. Wakefield. The Loss of Sadness: How Psychiatry Transformed Normal Misery into Depressive Disorder. Oxford University Press, 2007.  
(Winner Association of American Publishers Best Book Award 2007, Psychology Category)

Ellen Idler (on leave, 2009-10)
Idler, Ellen. Julie Phillips, Ashley Robin, Colleen Nugent.   “Understanding Recent Changes in Suicide Rates among the Middle-Aged: Period or Cohort Effects?”   Under review.
Idler, Ellen, Julie McLaughlin, and Stanislav Kasl. 2009. “Religion and the Quality of Life in the Last Year of Life”.  Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences 64B(4): 528-537.
Idler, Ellen.  In press. “Health and Religion.” In Blackwell Companion Series on Medical Sociology. William Cockerham, Editor. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.  MS 44 pp.
Idler, Ellen, Richard J. Contrada, David A. Boulifard, Erich W.  Labouvie, Yung Chen, Tyrone J. Krause.  2009. “Looking in the Black Box of ‘Attendance at Services’: Exploring an Old Dimension for Religion and Health Research.” International Journal for the Psychology of Religion 19:1-20.
Idler, Ellen. 2006. “Religion and Aging.” In Handbook of Aging and the Social Sciences  6th Edition. Robert H. Binstock and Linda K. George, (Editors), pp.277-300.  San Diego: Elsevier.

Joanna Kempner
Kempner Joanna. 2008. “The Chilling Effect: How Do Researchers React to Controversy?” Public Library of Science Medicine. 5(11): e222. 
Kempner, Joanna. 2006. "Uncovering the man in medicine: Lessons learned from a case study of cluster headache." Gender & Society. 20(5): 632-656.
Kempner, Joanna. 2006. "Gendering the migraine market: Do representations of illness matter?" Social Science & Medicine. 63(8): 1986-1997.

David Mechanic
He has written or edited 24 books and approximately 400 research articles, chapters and other publications in medical sociology, health policy, health services research, and the social and behavioral sciences. Among his more recent publications are: Mental Health and Social Policy: Beyond Managed Care (5th Edition, 2008); The Truth About Health Care: Why Reform Is Not Working in America (2006); Mechanic, et al. (Eds.), Policy Challenges in Modern Health Care (2005). Other recent publications include “Rationing Health Care” in R.M. Mullner (Ed.) Encyclopedia of Health Services Research, Sage Publications 2009; “Rethinking Medical Professionalism: The Role of Information Technology and Practice Innovations,” Milbank Quarterly 86(2): 327-358, 2008; “Vulnerable People, Groups and Populations: A Societal View” (with Jennifer Tanner), Health Affairs (26)5: 1220-1230, 2007; “Population Health: Challenges for Science and Society,” Milbank Quarterly 85(3): 533-559, 2007; “Policy Challenges in Addressing Racial Disparities and Improving Population Health,” Health Affairs 24(2): 335-338, 2005; “The Rise and Fall of Managed Care,” Journal of Health and Social Behavior 45(extra issue): 76-86, 2004.

Catherine Lee
2009. “‘Race’ and ‘Ethnicity’ in Biomedical Research: How do Scientists Construct and Explain Difference in Health?” Social Science and Medicine. 68(6): 1183-1190. 

Julie Phillips
Phillips, Julie A., Ashley V. Robin, Colleen Nugent, and Ellen L. Idler.  2009. “Understanding Recent Changes in Suicide Rates among the Middle-Aged: Period or Cohort Effects?”    Under review.
Phillips, Julie A.  “Factors Associated with Spatial and Temporal Variation in Suicide Rates.”  American Foundation for the Prevention of Suicide.  2007-2009.
Phillips, Julie A. 2006. “Explaining Discrepant Findings in Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal Analyses: An Application to U.S. Homicide Rates.”  Social Science Research  35(4): 948-974.
Phillips, Julie A.  2006.  “The Relationship between Age Structure and Homicide Rates in the United States, 1970-1999.”   Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 43(3): 230-260.
Rosenfield, Sarah, Julie A. Phillips, and Helene Raskin White.  2006. “Gender, Race and the Self in Mental Health and Crime.” Social Problems 53(2): 161-185.
 
Sarah Rosenfield
Rosenfield, Sarah. forthcoming.  "Gender and Mental Health,” in Allan Horwitz and Teresa         Sheid, eds., A Handbook for the Study of Mental Health: Social Contexts, Theories,              Systems.  New York: Cambridge University Press.Rosenfield, Sarah, Julie Phillips, and Helene Raskin White. 2006. “Gender, Race, and the Self in Mental Health and Crime,” Social Problems 53:161-185.           
Rosenfield, Sarah, Mary Clare Lennon, and Helene White. 2005. "Mental Health and the Self: The Impact of Self-Salience," Journal of Health and Social Behavior 6:326-340.

Kristen Springer
Deborah Carr & Kristen W. Springer. Forthcoming.  “Advances in Families and Health Research in the 21st Century.” Journal of Marriage and Family. (Expected Publication Date: December, 2010).
David Russell, Kristen W. Springer & Emily A. Greenfield. Forthcoming. “Witnessing Domestic Abuse in Childhood as an Independent Risk Factor for Depressive Symptoms in Young Adulthood.”  Child Abuse & Neglect: The International Journal.
Kristen W. Springer. Forthcoming. “The Race and Class Privilege of Motherhood: New York Times Presentations of Pregnant Drug-Using Women.” Sociological Forum. (Expected Publication Date: September, 2010).
Lisa Bates, Olena Hankivsky & Kristen W. Springer. 2009. “Gender and Health Inequities: A Comment on the WHO Commission on the Social Determinants of Health Final Report.” Social Science & Medicine. 69(7). 1002-1004.
Kristen W. Springer. 2009.“Childhood Physical Abuse and Mid-Life Physical Health: Testing a Multi-Pathway Life Course Model.” Social Science & Medicine. 69(1). 138-146.

Helene White
White, Helene R., Charles B. Fleming, Richard F. Catalano,  and  Jennifer Bailey. Forthcoming. “Prospective Associations among Alcohol Use-related Sexual Enhancement Expectancies, Sex after Alcohol Use, and Casual Sex. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors.
White, Helene R., Bethany C. Bray, Charles B. Fleming, and Richard F. Catalano. 2009. “Transitions Into and Out of Light and Intermittent Smokingfrom Adolescence into Emerging Adulthood.” Nicotine & Tobacco Research :, 211-219.
White, Helene R., Charles B. Fleming,  Min Jung Kim,  Richard Catalano,  and Barbara McMorris. 2008. Identifying Two Potential Mechanisms for Changes in Alcohol Use among College-attending and Non-attending Emerging Adults.  Developmental Psychology 44: 1625-1639.
White, Helene R., EunYoung Mun, and T. J. Morgan. 2008).  Do Brief Personalized Feedback Interventions Work for Mandated Students or Is It Just Getting Caught That Works? Psychology of Addictive Behaviors 22:107-116.
White, Helene R., Nicole Jarrett, Elvia Y. Valencia,  Rolf Loeber, & Evelyn Wei . 2007. Stages and Sequences of Initiation and Regular Substance Use in a Longitudinal Cohort of African American and White Male Adolescents. Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs 68: 173-181.

Ben Zablocki
Misunderstanding Cults: Searching for Objectivity in a Controversial Field [edited volume, Zablocki and Robbins] Toronto: University of Toronto Press.  (2001).
Alienation and Charisma: A Study of Contemporary American Communes.  New York:  The Free Press.  (1980)
The Joyful Community: An Account of the Bruderhof— A Communal Movement     Now in Its Third Generation.  Chicago:  University of Chicago Press (1980)  (originally published by Penguin Books, 1971)
“The Reliability and Validity of Apostate Accounts in the Study of New Religious Movements.”  Apologetics Index (2003)
“The Urban Communes Data Set: A Gold Mine for Secondary Research” Connections 24:54-59 (with John Levi Martin and King-To Yeung) (2002)

Graduate Student Awards

Dawne Mouzon. Society for the Study of Social Problems (SSSP). Best Graduate Student Paper Award 2009. Mental Health Division.
Julie McLaughlin. American Sociological Association (ASA) Best Dissertation Award 2004, Mental Health Section
Tami Videon. ASA Best Dissertation Award 2003, Mental Health Section