New Research Guide: Employment by Occupation and Industry
Dr. Devan Hawkins, Assistant Professor at the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences, has authored a new SDOH research guide, Employment by Occupation and Industry. This guide explains the ways in which work is a significant social determinant of health, due to how much of a person's life is spent in a workplace. This guide provides an overview of methods for understanding work-related health issues at the community level.
In this Guide
The guide provides information regarding work as a social determinant of health and how it contributes to community health. The guide explains how raw occupation and industry data can be categorized using a number of industry and occupation classification systems for researchers gathering primary employment data. Dr. Hawkins also highlights theoretical frameworks on how work impacts health, how employment and industry information can be used for health studies, and methods for estimating community-level job exposures to hazards affecting health and wellbeing.
About the Author
Devan Hawkins is an Assistant Professor of Public Health, and the Director of Undergraduate Health Program, at the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences. Dr. Hawkins' research focuses on topics such as occupational risk and health-related workplace disparities.
About the Research Guides
The SDOH & Place Project works to build a community of practice around the definition & use of community-level SDOH data. To support these efforts, our SDOH Guides help focus and refine best practices and approaches in measuring distinct SDOH indicators or structural drivers of health at community or regional scales.
The guides are written by new and emerging scholars across the fields of SDOH research, including geography, social science, and public health, and reviewed by experts in the field. Each one takes an SDOH topic, breaking down the jargon to clarify understanding and providing direct recommendations. The research guides will continue to be updated according to research directions that unfold.
Interested in writing or reviewing a Research Guide? Learn more here.
