Bio

Dr. Roberta Downing just began a position as the Health Legislative Assistant for Senator Sherrod Brown. Prior to working for Senator Brown, she was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health as part of the W. K. Kellogg Community Health Scholars Program. At Johns Hopkins, she conducted community-based participatory research with low-income adolescents in Baltimore. Prior to her postdoctoral fellowship, Dr. Downing was an American Psychological Association Congressional Fellow for Senator Edward M. Kennedy in the health policy office of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions. Dr. Downing completed her Ph.D. in social psychology with a parenthetical notation in women’s studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Her research focuses on economic justice, health disparities, women’s health, affirmative action, and adolescent health. Dr. Downing spent four years working in the AIDS community in Los Angeles before attending graduate school.

 

Presentation

Psychologists Addressing Inequality:

The Importance of Understanding Gender, Race, Social Class, and Communities in our Work

Inequality is a pervasive problem in the United States and manifests in unequal power relations according to one’s gender, race/ethnicity, and social class. Various social indicators demonstrate that people of color are more likely to experience worse health, lower wages, less wealth, higher rates of incarceration, and segregation than Whites. Women in low-income communities often face the additional challenges of raising children with few resources in violent neighborhoods with crumbling schools.

The field of psychology has only recently begun to address issues of gender, race, and social class in research and training. However, there is much that psychologists can do to address issues surrounding inequality in their work. Research paradigms like community-based participatory research provide insights into how psychologists can partner with communities in powerful ways to address inequality in all its forms. Psychologists can also use their expertise to influence policies that address inequality.

As an example of how psychologists can partner with communities and receive the attention of policymakers, Dr. Downing will present a case study of a Photovoice project she conducted in Baltimore with low-income youth of color that focused on the topic of love.