I study families all day –
and then spend time with my favorite.
I’m a family scholar and demographer at the University of Minnesota. I also live my work-family research in real time – I am married with four kids. I also love to read and listen to books, exercise, garden, karaoke, and air guitar. Here’s a little about me.
Background
I’m a professor in the Department of Sociology and the Minnesota Population Center at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. I got here by making my way through four other land grant universities.
I studied Human Development and Family Studies as an undergraduate at Illinois, earned my master’s and Ph.D. in the same field at Penn State, and did a postdoc at Cornell’s Institute for the Social Sciences with the Evolving Family Theme Project before landing my first faculty job at Ohio State in Human Development and Family Science which eventually became Human Ecology. I spent thirteen years at Ohio State, rising from assistant professor to professor, before coming to Minnesota.
Along the way I was trained by a psychologist (Joe Pleck), a clinical psychologist (Cathy Cohan), a sociologist (Paul Amato), and an economist (Liz Peters) — which is how I ended up an interdisciplinary relationship scientist and family demographer.
Personal
I grew up on a farm in Illinois with my parents and three sisters. Now my husband Aaron and I have four children. I had two in grad school and two on the tenure track. As a family, we love playing games and camping — around Minnesota and at the National Parks .
In my free time I run and do CrossFit, cook and bake, garden, read and listen to books, sing karaoke and play a mean air guitar, and walk the lake by my house.
Books
I’m an avid reader — you can find me on Goodreads. A running list of favorites, by year:
An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s · Doris Kearns Goodwin (audio)
Leslie F*cking Jones · Leslie Jones (audio)
The Housemaid · Freida McFadden (audio)
Lessons in Chemistry · Bonnie Garmus
The No Club: Putting a Stop to Women’s Dead-End Work · Linda Babcock
The Silent Patient · Alex Michaelides
The One Hundred Years of Lenni and Margot · Marianne Cronin
The Husbands · Chandler Baker
The Orphan Master’s Son · Adam Johnson
Cloud Cuckoo Land · Anthony Doerr (audio)
I’m Glad My Mom Died · Jennette McCurdy (audio)
Scenes from My Life: A Memoir · Michael K. Williams (audio)
Remarkably Bright Creatures · Shelby Van Pelt
Dear Edward · Ann Napolitano
The Guest List · Lucy Foley (audio)
Betty · Tiffany McDaniel
The Storyteller: Tales of Life and Music · Dave Grohl (audio)
In a Holidaze · Christina Lauren
Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland · Patrick Radden Keefe
The Lager Queen of Minnesota · J. Ryan Stradal
Daisy Jones & the Six · Taylor Jenkins Reid (audio)
Maybe You Should Talk to Someone · Lori Gottlieb (audio)
Pachinko · Min Jin Lee
A False Report: A True Story of Rape in America · T. Christian Miller
Educated · Tara Westover (audio)
We’re Going to Need More Wine · Gabrielle Union (audio)
Hunger · Roxane Gay (audio)
You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me · Sherman Alexie (audio)
The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend · Katarina Bivald
All the Birds in the Sky · Charlie Jane Anders
Homegoing · Yaa Gyasi
Kitchens of the Great Midwest · J. Ryan Stradal
The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry · Gabrielle Zevin
The Thirteenth Tale · Diane Setterfield
People of the Book · Geraldine Brooks
All the Light We Cannot See · Anthony Doerr
Me Before You · Jojo Moyes
Station Eleven · Emily St. John Mandel
We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves · Karen Joy Fowler
Beautiful Ruins · Jess Walter
The Hundred-Foot Journey · Richard C. Morais
The Rosie Project · Graeme Simsion
Where’d You Go, Bernadette · Maria Semple
The Round House · Louise Erdrich
Find me on the web