My research focuses on the application of epidemiologic and social science thinking and methods for rigorous causal inference in studying social determinants of health.

Specifically, I have worked on three themes of research. First, I study the effects of traumatic events (e.g., disasters, child adversity, pandemic, and global financial crisis) on population health. Second, I study the roles of social relationships and social engagement in promoting health of older adults and building resiliency. I have also investigated how the internet-based social interactions can influence population health. Third, my research extends the traditional “risk factor” epidemiology examining a narrow set of health outcomes. I study the impacts of positive psychological factors (e.g., purpose in life, Ikigai) on health and determinants of multidimensional well-being (i.e., human flourishing).

Methodologic tools for causal inference I often use include: methods for the analysis of a time-varying treatment (e.g., marginal structural model, doubly-robust targeted maximum likelihood estimation combined with Super Learner ensemble of algorithms including ML-based ones), causal mediation analysis, assessment of effect heterogeneity using either a traditional interaction analysis or a novel ML-based technique, and longitudinal outcome-wide analytic framework.

For the full list of publications, please visit my google scholar page.