News

Xuexin receives a Predoctoral Fellowship award!

Many congratulations to Xuexin Yu! She has received a Rackham Predoctoral Fellowship Award from the University of Michigan to support her PhD research for the 2023/2024 academic year.

Ashly receives an NIA-funded K99/R00 award!

Congratulations to Ashly! She received a prestigious K99/R00 award from the National Institute on Aging (K99AG076532). She will be researching risk and resilience factors in memory aging of older cancer survivors in a cross-national comparison of data from the US and England. Her primary mentors are Drs. Lindsay Kobayashi and Ken Langa.

Presentations at the GSA 2022 meeting

November 2nd-6th is the Gerontological Society of America (GSA) 2022 Annual Scientific Meeting in Indianapolis, IN. KRG members will present their work on a wide variety of topics:

Join us to learn more about their amazing work!

Xuexin will present in 2022 PAA

First-year doctoral student Xuexin Yu will present her amazing work at the Population Association of America (PAA) 2022 Annual Meeting, Cognitive Health and Aging section.

Title: Exposure to perceived job insecurity and subsequent memory function and decline among adults aged 55 and over in England and the United States: a pooled analysis of two population-based cohorts, 2006-2016
Time: April 8 (Fri) at 3:45pm

For the PAA attendees this year, go and learn more about her fabulous work!

Carly wins an award!

Sincere congratulations to Carly Joseph! She is presented with the United States Public Health Service Excellence in Public Health Award to recognize her passion and dedication to public health within the medical profession.

MPH Student Presenters at the U-M Epidemiology Poster Session!

The 2021 digital MPH poster session will be held on Friday, November 19th. Second-year Epidemiology MPH students will present their work and projects completed during the summer from 2:30-5:30 pm ET.

Several KRG members are presenting at this event:

Maya Sabbagh, poster title: “Depression in older adults after a maternal death: an analysis of the Health and Retirement Study”

Sarah Gao, poster title: “Distance to adult children and cognitive impairment in a longitudinal cohort of older South African adults”

Mansi Verma, poster title: “Socioeconomic gradients in depression among older adults in rural South Africa”

Join us to learn more about their great work!

Presentations at the GSA 2021 meeting

During Nov. 10-13 at the Gerontological Society of America (GSA) 2021 Annual Scientific Meeting Online, KRG members will present their work on a wide variety of topics:

Poster
(Nov 11) Ashly C. Westrick. Memory Aging Phenotypes Among Older Cancer Survivors: A Latent Growth Analysis of the Health and Retirement Study
(Nov 12) Brendan O’Shea. Loneliness Among US Adults During the Early Phase of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Findings From the COVID-19 Coping Study

Symposium
(Nov 10) Carly Joseph. Physical Isolation and Mental Health Among Older U.S. Adults in the COVID-19 Coping Study. Symposium: Social Isolation and Well-Being Among Middle-Age and Older Adults: Before and During the COVID-19 Outbreak.
(Nov 10) Greta Cheng. Associations between comorbidity and depressive symptoms among middle-aged and older US adults during COVID-19 pandemic: Are there differences by degree of social isolation? Symposium: Social Isolation and Well-Being Among Middle-Age and Older Adults: Before and During the COVID-19 Outbreak.
(Nov 11) Megan Mullins. Validation of Self-Reported Cancer Diagnosis by Cognitive Status in the Health and Retirement Study. Paper Session: Morbidity, Mortality, and Aging.

Join us to learn more about their amazing work!

New PhD students join the team!

In September 2021, Tsai-Chin (TC) Cho and Xuexin Yu joined the team as new PhD students in Epidemiologic Sciences at University of Michigan School of Public Health.

TC’s research interests revolve around social and contextual components of cross-national health disparities and healthcare utilization. Xuexin is interested in the effects of socioeconomic trajectories on cognitive aging among older adults in South Africa, China, and the United States.

They are beginning their PhD studies under the mentorship of Dr. Lindsay Kobayashi.

Ashly’s LRP got funded!

Postdoctoral Research Fellow Ashly Westrick received three-year funding through the NIA/NIH Loan Repayment Program for her project: “Racial Disparities in Memory Aging Among Older Cancer Survivors: A Socioecological Approach”

Dr. Westrick’s project primarily aims to characterize long-term memory aging trajectories and racial disparities in memory aging among older cancer survivors, and to identify modifiable individual and socioecological determinants of long-term memory aging that could be future screening or early detection intervention targets to reduce disparities among older cancer survivors.

This project will help identify and evaluate disparities in long-term memory aging among older White and Black adults, by linking 20 years of US nationally representative data- Health and Retirement Study (HRS)- to the National Neighborhood Data Archive (NaNDA), a national data archive containing over three decades of contextual measures.

Congratulations, Dr. Westrick!

Congrats, Marisa!

Former Research Associate, Marisa Eastman, took the next step in her career as a Public Health Analyst at RTI International in Durham, North Carolina. Starting in August 2021, Marisa has been leading evaluation of an NIH-funded biomedical translational science program and assisting in outreach, engagement, and coordination between stakeholders.

Congratulations, Marisa!