Health inequalities and social mobility

A central strand of my research examines how social mobility — both objective and perceived — affects health and mortality at the population level. Using register data from Norway, cross-national surveys, and experimental designs, I have established that equality of opportunity is linked to lower mortality across countries, that wealth predicts mortality among late-middle-aged individuals, and that subjective social status asymmetrically predicts mortality risk in the United States. I have also shown that perceived social mobility has causal effects on health using fixed-effects approaches, and that downward income mobility among individuals with poor initial health is associated with higher cardiometabolic risk.

This body of work demonstrates that the relationship between social position and health is not simply a matter of material resources but is shaped by how people perceive their position and trajectory relative to others.

Key publications