Samer Atshan

Samer Atshan is a Postdoctoral Scholar at the Center for Economic and Social Science Research within the Program on Global Aging, Health, and Policy. His research interests span social and psychiatric epidemiology, with an aim to understand how the environment shapes mental and behavioral health outcomes, loneliness, social isolation, and well-being. He earned his PhD in policy analysis from the Pardee RAND Graduate School while conducting research as an assistant policy researcher at the RAND Corporation. During that time, he worked extensively with large-scale surveys such as the Understanding America Study, the American Life Panel, and the Survey of Trauma, Resilience, and Opportunity among Neighborhoods in the Gulf. His current focus is on using the HRS international family of studies to understand the relationship between environmental exposures and mental health in older age. He also has a master’s in public affairs from the University of Texas at Austin, and a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering from the American University of Beirut.