Faculty & Staff
Benita Jackson
Associate Professor
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Send E-mail |  |
Office: Bass Hall 406 |  |
Phone: (413) 585-7694 Lab: (413) 585-3985 |
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Benita Jackson is interested in how environments - social, cultural, physical - are internalized and shape health. Her major focus is on sub-clinical disease markers such as depressive symptoms and pulmonary function. She holds degrees from Berkeley (BA, Cognitive Science major, Women’s Studies minor), Michigan (MA, Personality Psychology; PhD, Personality Psychology and Women’s Studies) and Harvard (MPH, Quantitative Methods with an emphasis on social epidemiology).
She directs the Society, Psychology, and Health Laboratory, where her team conducts research on psychological and physical correlates and consequences of social status. She has strong research, teaching, and applied interests in how these processes are linked to health disparities and prevention. Jackson and her collaborators employ a range of research methods, including experiments with college samples, observational studies of community samples, and meta-analyses.
She is committed to preparing undergraduates and post-baccalaureates for rigorous graduate study in fields including Psychology, Public Health, and Medicine. Jackson also serves on the steering committee and is a campus adviser for the Five College Certificate Program in Culture, Health, and Science.
