Jane Ava Menken

Professor Jane Menken is Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Research Professor in the Institute of Behavioral Science at the University of Colorado Boulder. Previously, she held positions at the University of Pennsylvania, Princeton University, Columbia University, and Harvard University. Jane Menken's main area of research has been fertility; she has developed mathematical models of reproduction and analytic techniques and carried out studies of the increase in sterility as women age, of fertility determinants in Bangladesh, and of teenage pregnancy and childbearing in the United States. Her more recent research concerns population policy, child mortality in developing countries, and demographic change in South Asia, especially as it relates to family networks as determinants of health and education and the effects of early life conditions on adult health, particularly of women. Recent work is demonstrating the long-term relationship of health in early adulthood to women's survival in rural Bangladesh over a 20-year followup period and their health at the end of that period. Currently, she is part of a research team that has documented the effect of increased access to contraception on women's high school and college completion.