people

Elizabeth Ackert

Elizabeth Ackert
Geography
University of California, Santa Barbara
Assistant Professor

I am an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography at the University of California, Santa Barbara. My research interests include racial/ethnic inequality, immigration, education, health disparities, urban geography, and quantitative methods. My individual and collaborative work examines explanations for why racial/ethnic and immigrant-origin groups are unequally distributed across contexts– including schools, neighborhoods, and immigrant destinations– and evaluates the consequences of this contextual inequality for disparities in outcomes in domains such as education, residential mobility, and health. I am particularly interested in understanding how the attributes of immigrant-receiving contexts, including states, communities, neighborhoods, and schools, influence the educational and health outcomes of children and adolescents of Mexican origin.

Grants, Awards and Distinctions:

 UCSB Office of Research Early-Stage Seed Grants Award Facilitating the Integration of U.S. Climate and Human Population Data (PI) 2022. $9,976

UCSB Faculty Career Development Award U.S. Latinx Destinations, Education, and Health. 2021-2022. $5,000

NICHD R03 Award. Immigrant Destinations, Institutional Supports, and Health among Latino/a Children. (PI; co-Investigator is Dr. Robert Crosnoe) 2018-2021. $100,000 

NSF (SES- Sociology) Award. Kin Location, Neighborhood Disadvantage, and Health and Well-Being across the Life Course. (co-PI with Drs. Amy Spring and Nicole Kravitz-Wirtz). 2020-2023. $450,000

NSF Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellowship. Immigrant Destinations and Achievement and Participation in STEM among Mexican-Origin Students. (PI). 2018-2019. $138,000

Publications

Amy, Elizabeth Ackert, Sarah Roche, Dionne Parris, Kyle Crowder, Nicole Kravitz-Wirtz. 2023 (on-line). 
"Keeping Kin Close? Geographies of Family Networks by Race and Income, 1981-2017."
Journal of Marriage and Family 85(4):962-986. https://doi.org/10.1111/jomf.12911
Wikle, Jocelyn, and Ackert, Elizabeth. 2022. 
"Child Citizenship Status in Immigrant Families and Differential Parental Time Investments in Siblings. "
Social Sciences (Special Issue: “Rethinking the Mobilities of Migrant Children and Youth Across the Americas”). 11(11):507. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci11110507
Ackert, Elizabeth, and Jocelyn Wikle. 2022. 
"Familism among Latino/a Adolescents: Evidence from Time-Use Data. "
Journal of Marriage and Family. 84(3):879-899. http://doi.org/10.1111/jomf.12809
Ackert, Elizabeth, Matthew Snidal, and Robert Crosnoe. 2021.
"The Development of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Identity among Mexican-Origin Youth across Latino/a Destinations."
Developmental Psychology. 57(11):1910-1925. https://doi.org/10.1037/dev0001251
Ackert, Elizabeth, Sung Hee Hong, Jessica Martinez, Gabriel Van Praag, Pedro Aristizabal, and Robert Crosnoe. 2021. 
"Understanding the Health Landscapes where Latinx Immigrants Establish Residence in the United States.”"
Health Affairs. 40(7): 1108-1116.
Ackert, Elizabeth, Matthew Snidal, and Robert Crosnoe. 2021. 
"The Development of STEM Efficacy and Identity among Mexican-Origin Youth across Latino/a Destinations. "
Developmental Psychology. 
Ressler, Robert W., Elizabeth Ackert, Arya Ansari, and Robert Crosnoe. 2020. 
"Race/ethnicity, human capital, and the selection of young children into early childhood education. "
Social Science Research 85: 102364. 
Ackert, Elizabeth, Robert Ressler, Arya Ansari, and Robert Crosnoe. 2020. 
"Community Contexts, Supply of Early Childhood Programs, and Pre-Kindergarten Enrollment among Mexican- Origin Children."
Early Childhood Research Quarterly. 52(A):4-14. 
Wikle, Jocelyn S., Elizabeth Ackert, and Alexander C. Jensen. 2019. 
"Companionship patterns and emotional states during social interactions for adolescents with and without siblings. "
Journal of Youth and Adolescence 48, no. 11: 2190-2206. 
Research Themes:
Ackert, Elizabeth, Robert Crosnoe, and Tama Leventhal. 2019. 
"New Destinations and the Early Childhood Education of Mexican-Origin Children. "
Demography 56, no. 5: 1607-1634.  
Ackert, Elizabeth, Amy Spring, Kyle Crowder, and Scott J. South. 2019. 
"Kin location and racial disparities in exiting and entering poor neighborhoods. "
Social science research 84: 102346.