Selected Current Research Projects and Working Papers
A Mixed-Methods Assessment of the Impact of the Rural Healthcare Exit on the Health Outcomes of Older Adults in Rural America
Description: I am leading an effort to robustly document the trends in healthcare services related to older adults in rural America, as well as the impacts that rural service decline is having on the health and well-being of this population.
Funder: Interdisciplinary Network on Rural Population Health and Aging
PI: J. Tom Mueller
Co-I: Alexis Merdjanoff, Joshua Fergen
Years: 2023 -
U01: The Effect of Medicaid Expansion on Mortality Disparities and Poverty
Description: I am leading a study where we are using restricted-use data to investigate the role of Medicaid expansion in rural-urban ethnic and racial mortality disparities, as well as generate new estimates of rural poverty and evaluate the role of poverty reduction in mortality reductions.
Funder: NIH-NIMHD
PI: J. Tom Mueller
Co-I: Matthew M. Brooks, Regina Baker
Years: 2023 -
Understanding the Link between Water Infrastructure and Economic Development in Rural America
Description: Myself and Stephen Gasteyer are working with the Rural Community Assistance Partnership (RCAP) to evaluate the relationship between water infrastructure and rural economic development. We are doing so using a variety of secondary data sources, as well as primary qualitative case studies.
Funder: USDA-NIFA
P.I.: Stephen Gasteyer
Co-PI: J. Tom Mueller
Co-I: RCAP
Years: 2021-
The Long-term Association between Unsafe Community Drinking Water, Adult Mortality, and Mortality Disparities in the United States
Description: I am leading a team in a pilot effort to assess the relationship between violations under the Safe Drinking Water Act in 2000 and mortality in 2017 at the county level in the United States. Working with two research assistants at OU, we are analyzing overall impacts and disparities between ethnoracial and rural-urban groups.
Funder: Network on Life Course Health Dynamics and Disparities in 21st Century America (NLCHDD)
P.I.: J. Tom Mueller
Years: 2022
Understanding Natural Resource-Related Economic Development in Rural America
Description: Working with a team at Penn State, we are evaluating the relationship between natural resource development (of all forms) on well-being in the rural United States. This project employs secondary data analysis, primary survey research, and qualitative case studies.
Funder: USDA-NIFA
P.I.: Brian Thiede
Co-I’s: J. Tom Mueller, Ann Tickamyer, Kai Schafft, Alan Graefe
Years: 2020 -
Covid-19 and the Rural American West
Description: Working with the Farrell Lab from the Yale School of the Environment, we are assessing the impacts of, and experiences with, the Covid-19 pandemic across the rural American West. Funded by an NSF-RAPID grant, we have administered two waves of survey data collection. Topics under examination include experiences with Covid-19, economic impacts, social impacts, attitudes towards government relief, mental health, and satisfaction with government response.
Years: 2020 - 2023
Preliminary results are available in a brief report here: https://www.covidruralwest.org/
Link to published articles:
https://www.pnas.org/content/118/1/2019378118.short
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0091743521004928
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/978-1-80262-115-020231009/full/html
Water Hardship and Environmental Injustice in the United States
Description: Working with Stephen Gasteyer at Michigan State University, we are documenting the full scope of household water hardship in the United States. Using data from the Census and the EPA, we find that there exists an underappreciated household water crisis of both incomplete plumbing and poor water quality in the United States. Further, we find this represents a nationwide environmental injustice, with water hardship - particularly incomplete plumbing - being unequally spread across the social dimensions of age, indigeneity, poverty, education, and rurality.
Years: 2020 - 2021
Link to published paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-23898-z
Effects of Natural Resource Dependence on Rural America (Dissertation)
Description: By integrating multiple theoretical perspective and analyzing longitudinal data I theorize and assess the impact that extractive and non-extractive natural resource dependence has had on rural poverty, inequality, and income growth. Please see the dissertation page for more information and working papers.
Funder: National Science Foundation
P.I.: Brian Thiede
Co-P.I.: J. Tom Mueller, Ann R. Tickamyer
Years: 2018 - 2020
Working paper of first article on SocArXiv: https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/e4akp/
Working paper of second article on SocArXiv: https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/5pcwm/
Working paper of third article on SocArXiv: https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/j5skm/