Catherine Cubbin is a Clara Pope Willoughby Centennial Professor in Community Safety and Associate Dean for Research in the Steve Hicks School of Social Work, courtesy Professor at Dell Medical School, and a faculty scholar at the Population Research Center, The University of Texas at Austin.
Cubbin received her PhD in Health and Social Policy from the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health in 1998. She was trained as a CDC fellow at the National Center for Health Statistics and completed an NIH postdoctoral fellowship at Stanford University in 2000.
Cubbin’s research focuses on using epidemiological methods to better understand socioeconomic and racial/ethnic inequalities in health for the purpose of informing policy. Specific areas of her research include using contextual analysis to investigate how neighborhood environments may explain social inequalities in health, and the measurement of socioeconomic status/position in studies of racial/ethnic disparities in health. Using national and statewide representative data sets, she has studied social inequalities in injuries, cardiovascular disease, health behaviors, mortality, and maternal, infant, and adolescent health. She has published widely in public health and medical journals, including the American Journal of Public Health, the Journal of the American Medical Association, and the American Journal of Epidemiology.
From 2001-2006, Cubbin was a Health Disparities Scholar through the National Institutes of Health, and since 1997, she has been a coordinating committee member of the Spirit of 1848, a caucus of the American Public Health Association which focuses on issues related to health and social justice. Cubbin served an associate editor for the Journal Health & Place and a deputy editor for the journal Demography. In 2021, she was inducted into the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare. She won the Outstanding Graduate Teaching Award from the Graduate School at UT Austin in 2022, and was named in the top 30 of “Best Scientists – Social Sciences and Humanities” at UT Austin in 2023 by Research.com.
Professional Interests
Social epidemiology; social inequalities in health; neighborhood environments and health; conceptualization and measurement of socioeconomic status/position
Press
- Protests could lead to spike in coronavirus cases, health and local officials warn (2020)
- Her Neighborhood, Her Health (2020)
Posts
- Teach boys to respect women
- San Antonio scores a win for public health. Other Texas cities should follow
- We can do more for poor families
- Mental health and violence on campus
- Looming U.S. Zika threat highlights perennial low-birth weight crisis for Black moms
- In Flint, pregnant women must be worrying
- Violence is a solvable problem
Research
- Research Training to Promote Scientist Diversity & Health Equity in Cardiovascular & Lung Disease (2028)
- Urban planning, siting of air pollution sources, and asthma disparities (2027)
- SCC-IRG Track 2: Integrating Information Flows and Supporting Communities as Decision-Makers in Response to Acute and Chronic Stressors (2024)
- Co-Creating a Community Hub for Smart Mobility: A University-Government-Nonprofit Partnership (2023)
- Cardiovascular Health Among Women During “Established Adulthood”: Neighborhood Effects and County-Level Urban/Rural Status in Texas (2023)
- Post-doctoral fellowship: Promoting equity in cardiovascular health (2023)
- Longitudinal neighborhood poverty change and racial disparities in birth outcomes (2018)
- Increasing breast and cervical cancer screening in rural, frontier, and border counties (2017)
- Environmental effects on disparities in smoking and obesity among women (2016)
- Evaluation Plan: Community Transformation Grant (2014)
- Obesity Prevention ARRA Evaluation (2012)
- Vegetables On Wheels: Increasing access to fresh fruits and vegetables in a rural Texas community (2012)
- RWJF Commission to Build a Healthier America (2010)
- Measuring wealth in health disparities research: practical recommendations (2010)
- Texas Teen Opportunity Project (T-TOP) (2010)
RESEARCH PROJECTS WITH THE POPULATION RESEARCH CENTER