Kathleen Ziol-Guest

Kathleen Ziol-Guest

Kathleen M. Ziol-Guest joined the Department of Policy Analysis & Management in 2010.  Prior to this, she spent two years as the Assistant Director of the Institute for Children and Poverty in New York City.  From 2006-2008 she was a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) Health and Society Scholar at the Harvard School of Public Health where she focused on understanding the health effects of non-health policies.  Her research interests are centered on the demographic characteristics and socioeconomic environments of families as contexts for individual development.  Kathleen's policy interests are focused especially on how public policies shape population health and welfare, specifically by influencing family and child well-being among low income and economically disadvantaged populations.

In addition to her affiliation with Cornell, Kathleen is also a Senior Researcher at Statistics Norway in Social and Demographic Research.  Kathleen received her Ph.D. in Public Policy from the Harris School at The University of Chicago and holds a Master of Public Affairs from Indiana University's School of Public and Environmental Affairs.

Kathleen’s research interests in child and family policy are interdisciplinary, shaped by theories in public policy, economics, developmental psychology, demography, and social epidemiology; and are focused on understanding the relationships between family conditions and health and wellbeing.  Specific research areas include the relationship between maternal employment patterns and children’s development, health, and wellbeing; socioeconomic conditions (including poverty, income instability, and income inequality) across the lifecourse and eventual attainment, behavior, and health; and the influence of living arrangements (especially single-father families) on child wellbeing and development.

In a grant from the MacArthur Foundation's "How Housing Matters to Families & Communities" program, Kathleen’s work on socioeconomic conditions in childhood has expanded to understand the relationship between housing instability and child well-being with a particular interest in children from low-income families.  She is also expanding her work on children’s living arrangements and family structure to include grandmother households.

Kathleen's work has been published in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), Child Development, American Journal of Public Health, Journal of Marriage & Family, and Social Science & Medicine.

Ph.D., Public Policy, Harris School, University of Chicago, 2005
M.P.A., Public Affairs, SPEA, Indiana University-Bloomington
B.A., Psychology and Political Science, Indiana University-Bloomington

Statistics Norway, Social and Demographic Research

Ziol-Guest, K. M., & McKenna, C. (Accepted for publication). Early childhood residential instability and school readiness: Role of poverty. Child Development.

Duncan, G. J., Kalil, A., & Ziol-Guest, K. M. (In press).  Early childhood poverty and adult productivity and health.  In A. J. Reynolds, J. A. Temple, & A. J. Rolnick (Eds.), Health and education in early childhood: Predictors, interventions, and policies.  Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Ziol-Guest, K. M., Dunifon, R. E., & Kalil, A. (In press).  Parental employment and children’s body weight: Mothers, others, and mechanisms. Social Science & Medicine.

Ziol-Guest, K. M., Duncan, G. J., Kalil, A., & Boyce, T. (In press).  Early childhood poverty, immune-mediated disease processes, and adult productivity. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

Ziol-Guest, K. M., & Kalil, A. (2012).  Health and medical care among the children of immigrants.  Child Development, 83(5), 1494-1500.

Duncan, G., J., Magnuson, K., Kalil, A., & Ziol-Guest, K. M. (2012).  The importance of early childhood poverty.  Social Indicators Research, 108(1), 87-98.

Dunifon, R. E., Ziol-Guest, K. M., & Kalil, A. (2012).  Non-standard work schedules and child development.  In V. Maholmes & R. King (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of poverty and child development (pp. 260-277).  New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Duncan, G. J., Telle, K., Ziol-Guest, K. M., & Kalil, A. (2011).  Economic deprivation in early childhood and adult outcomes: Comparative evidence from Norwegian Registry Data and the U.S. PSID. In R. Erikson, M. Jantti, & T. Smeeding (Eds.), Persistence, privilege, and parenting: The comparative study of intergenerational mobility (pp. 209-234). New York, NY: Russell Sage.

Ziol-Guest, K. M., & Hernandez, D. C. (2010).  First and second trimester WIC participation reduces breastfeeding and early introduction of cow’s milk during infancy. Journal of the American Dietetic Association, 110(5), 702-709.

Duncan, G. J., Ziol-Guest, K. M., & Kalil, A. (2010).  Early childhood poverty and adult attainment, behavior, and health. Child Development, 81,306-325.

Kalil, A., Ziol-Guest, K. M., Hawkley, L., & Cacioppo J. T. (2010).  Job insecurity and health among older men and women. Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences, 65B(1), 81-90.

Hernandez, D. C., & Ziol-Guest, K. M. (2009). Income volatility and family structure patterns: Association with stability and change in Food Stamp program participation.  Journal of Family and Economic Issues, 30(4), 357-371.

Kalil, A., & Ziol-Guest, K. M.  (2009).   Welfare reform and health among the children of immigrants. In J. P. Ziliak (Ed.) Welfare reform and its long-term consequences for America’s poor (pp. 308-336). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Ziol-Guest, K. M.  (2009).  A single father’s shopping bag: Purchasing decisions in single-father families.  Journal of Family Issues, 30(5), 605-622.