Associate Professor Summer Sherburne Hawkins, PhD, MS, is a social epidemiologist with an interest in addressing policy-relevant research questions in maternal and child health. Her research examines the impact of policies on health disparities in parents and children, particularly using methodology that integrates epidemiology and economics. Dr. Hawkins has published on the topics of parental and adolescent tobacco use, infant feeding practices, and childhood obesity as well as the impact of state and local policies on disparities in these health behaviors and outcomes. A more recent area of her research focuses on the role of the Affordable Care Act on the uptake of preventive health services. In January 2017, she received a 3-year grant from the American Cancer Society titled, Impact of the ACA on the prevention and early detection of women鈥檚 cancers. Dr. Hawkins is currently on the editorial board of聽Maternal and Child Nutrition.聽Prior to joining BCSSW, Dr. Hawkins was a Cohort 7 Robert Wood Johnson Health & Society Scholar at the Harvard School of Public Health from 2009-2011.
