About

Jennifer Van Hook is the Roy C. Buck Professor of Sociology and Demography and serves as the Director of the Population Research Institute (PRI) at Pennsylvania State University. She is also a co-funded faculty member of the Social Science Research Institute (SSRI). Her educational background includes a Ph.D. from the University of Texas, obtained in 1996. Her research interests focus on demography, immigrant integration, and health, with particular attention to the health and well-being of immigrants and their children, as well as demographic techniques and health research. Her current research projects include using linked U.S. Census data to understand the assimilation process of Mexican immigrants across the twentieth century, examining differences in educational attainment and mobility among immigrant groups, and exploring how these factors have evolved following civil rights reforms. Her work engages with core debates about the successful integration of increasingly diverse immigrant populations in American society, emphasizing demographic methods to estimate the size, characteristics, and dynamics of the unauthorized foreign-born population and studying immigrant health outcomes.

Research topics

• Political Science
• Sociology
• Gerontology
• Demographic economics
• Geography
• Demography
• Environmental health
• Medicine

Selected publications

• Gender Differences in Dietary Quality and Dietary Acculturation among Mexican Children of Immigrants

  Journal of Immigrant and Minority Health · 2026-04-03

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Childhood obesity-a risk factor for heart disease, type 2 diabetes, other non-communicable diseases and adverse psychosocial experiences-is especially high among children of Mexican immigrants, and among these children, boys have an obesity risk nearly twice as high as girls. Yet little research has examined whether there are also gender differences in the proximate determinants of obesity for this population. This study uses structural equation modeling and the 2003/4-2017/18 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey to investigate gender differences in a key proximate determinant of obesity-diet-among adolescents with Mexican immigrant parents. We examine (1) whether there are gender differences in dietary quality and dietary acculturation, (2) whether gender differences in the settings in which adolescents eat explain gender differences in these outcomes, and (3) whether these patterns vary by parental acculturation (household language). We find that among adolescents in Spanish-speaking households, boys have significantly lower dietary quality and significantly higher dietary acculturation than girls and that gender differences in some meal settings outside the home contribute to these differences. We do not find statistically significant gender differences in the dietary outcomes or meal settings for adolescents in English-speaking households. Results highlight the importance of considering how gender and social contexts shape the health behaviors of children of Mexican immigrants.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Ending Birthright Citizenship Would Have Disparate Impacts on U.S.-born Children of Asian and Latino Immigrants

  Demography · 2026-03-31

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  In January 2025, the Trump administration issued an executive order that would redefine the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment by discontinuing birthright citizenship for future children born to certain noncitizen parents. Prior research estimates that ending birthright citizenship would increase the "unauthorized," or otherwise precarious noncitizen, population by 2.5 million in one decade. We show that the largest absolute impact of ending birthright citizenship would affect Latinos, who would compose nearly 80% of "unauthorized" births in the short term and more than 90% of U.S.-born "unauthorized" people by 2050, expanding the projected size of the Latino unauthorized population by nearly 30%. This projected increase is attributable to the fact that Latinos currently make up the largest share of unauthorized immigrants. After accounting for population size, however, we show that the Asian population would experience the largest relative impact of ending birthright citizenship, especially in the near future. Specifically, we project 41 "unauthorized" births per 1,000 unauthorized Asians, compared with 17 "unauthorized" births per 1,000 among Latinos. This disparate relative impact on Asians stems from their much larger share of temporary nonimmigrant visa holders, whose U.S.-born children would be newly classified as "unauthorized" under the executive order. These disparate absolute and relative impacts on millions of children and their families deserve a fuller understanding of the associated societal implications.

  PublisherDOI

• Preface

  Population and Development Review · 2025-03-01

  articleOpen accessSenior author
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Cross-Era Gender Differences in Educational Attainment Among Second-Generation Immigrants

  International Migration Review · 2025-04-17

  articleOpen access1st author

  Starting in the 1990s, the United States experienced a gender revolution in education whereby later-born cohorts of women surpassed men in rates of higher education completion. However, little research has explored how gender differences in education for second generation immigrants compare to the children of U.S.-born Whites over historical and contemporary time periods. Immigrants arrive with varying levels of socioeconomic status and may come from countries with paternalistic ideologies that reinforce traditional gender norms. However, immigrants also experience assimilation over time and may begin to mirror the U.S.-born in their educational outcomes by the second generation. While national trends show that women have surpassed men in years of education, we question whether immigrants will experience similar trends, or whether their outcomes will vary by national origin. We analyze newly obtainable linked census data collected from 1940 to the present, a timeline where linked data were previously unavailable, to test these ideas. These data offer insight into gendered trends in education by family background and socioeconomic status using a broader timeline than studies before. We find that while there is variation in the degree to which gender differences in education occur by ethnic origin, overall trends for immigrants are similar to those for U.S.-born Whites regardless of socioeconomic status in childhood. In the Industrial Era, men generally attained more years of schooling than women. However, there is greater gender equality and often a female advantage occurring for most groups in the post-Industrial Era. Educational trends for Blacks are an anomaly, whereby women have attained more years of schooling than men in both Eras.

  PublisherDOI

• Policy Brief

  Journal of Health and Social Behavior · 2025-11-28

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Immigration realities: challenging common misperceptions

  Ethnic and Racial Studies · 2025-02-10

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Why Do Black Women Have a Higher Obesity Prevalence Than White Women in the United States?

  Demography · 2025-12-01

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Although there are large Black‒White obesity inequities among women in the United States, the factors that explain this racialized health inequity are not well understood, most likely because previous research has generally focused on a limited number of adult obesity determinants. We posit that more fully explaining Black‒White female obesity inequities requires greater attention to multiple life course stages and obesity determinants, including upstream and proximate determinants. Results from this study support this notion. Our analysis of data from a national sample of Black and White women finds that socioeconomic and social disadvantages, such as living in disadvantaged neighborhoods and single-parent households as adolescents and having lower adult household income, explain the majority of group differences in obesity prevalence. Population health initiatives aimed at tackling racialized inequities in obesity will be most effective if they focus on systemic and structural determinants rather than individual-level behavioral factors alone. Moreover, interventions that target individuals earlier in the life course would help to alleviate Black‒White obesity inequities among women in the United States.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• VolhaCharnyshUprooted: How Post‐WWII Population Transfers Remade EuropeCambridge University Press, 2025. 320 p., $35.99.

  Population and Development Review · 2025-08-07

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Migration Status Gradients in Immigrant Poverty: A Comparison of Imputation Methods

  Sociological Methods & Research · 2025-09-26

  articleOpen access

  Research on the stratifying effects of migration status has increased sharply in the last two decades, although efforts have been hampered by the near absence of representative data that include detailed migration status measures. Researchers have developed various statistical and logical imputation methods that have produced widely varying estimates. In this article, we introduce a new indicator of migration status constructed from two federal surveys matched to the Social Security Administration's Numident file, a database that includes all citizens and legal residents of the United States. In models predicting poverty, our measure produces estimates comparable to those based on respondents' own self-reports, in one federal survey, of their migration status. Both the administrative and survey-based measures produce poverty gradients that diverge from those produced by logic-based measures. Our findings contribute to mounting evidence of bias in the use of certain kinds of logic-based algorithms to impute migration status and demonstrate the promise of administrative record linkages in migration status research.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• The Growth and Diversity of Older Undocumented Immigrants in the United States

  Demography · 2025-10-01

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  The undocumented immigrant population in the United States is aging and diversifying by origin group. However, research on aging among undocumented immigrants focuses on Mexicans and Central Americans, even as this population declines, and less is known about other groups. We analyze residual estimates of the undocumented population and the 2018‒2022 panels of the Survey of Income and Program Participation to document trends in age at arrival, duration in undocumented status, and socioeconomic and health correlates for undocumented immigrants across 27 countries or regions. We find dramatic increases in the older undocumented population across all origin groups, especially among those from Asia, the Caribbean, Europe, Canada, and Oceania. Aging in place drives population aging among the largest groups-those from Mexico, Central America, Venezuela, and India-while both aging in place and increases in arrivals at older ages are responsible for population aging among those from other origins. Additionally, undocumented status for older immigrants from most origins is associated with significant socioeconomic disadvantage regardless of age at arrival, but especially for those who age in place. This finding foreshadows rising inequality by legal status among America's seniors as the most disadvantaged immigrant groups age in place in coming decades.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• NIH Grant R03HD044700

  NIH · $128k · 2006

• NIH Grant P01HD062498

  NIH · $7.3M · 2017

• Training Program in Social Environments and Population Health

  NIH · $5.2M · 1999–2030

• NIH Grant R24HD041025

  NIH · $11.9M · 2016

• The Population Research Institute

  NIH · $2.8M · 2001–2027

Frequent coauthors

• Frank D. Bean

  University of California, Irvine

  21 shared

• Kelly Stamper Balistreri

  Bowling Green State University

  14 shared

• Michelle L. Frisco

  Pennsylvania State University

  12 shared

• Jennifer E. Glick

  Pennsylvania State University

  11 shared

• James D. Bachmeier

  11 shared

• Claire E. Altman

  10 shared

• Susana Quirós

  University of Missouri Health System

  6 shared

• Susan M. McHale

  Pennsylvania State University

  5 shared

Education

• PhD, Sociology

  University of Texas

  1996

Awards & honors

• Roy C. Buck Professor of Sociology and Demography