Jennifer Babitzke

Welcome, I am glad you are here. I am a doctoral candidate in the Department of Sociology at the University of Kansas. Over the past decade, I have worked as a marriage and family therapist, a university instructor, and a researcher focused on families, aging, disability, and caregiving. I view families as microcosms of broader social structures; the dynamics within them offer critical insights into social change, inequality, and the organization of care. My scholarly interests focus on the connections between gender, caregiving, family life, and how these experiences unfold across a person’s life. I am particularly interested in how caregiving responsibilities are socially patterned and internalized from childhood, and how these responsibilities impact caregiver well-being across time. As societies face major demographic shifts, including the aging of the population and the lasting effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, the need to understand and address the well-being of family caregivers has become more urgent than ever.

Since 2021, I have served as a graduate research assistant on multiple projects seeking to understand the experiences and needs of individuals with long-term care needs during and beyond the COVID-19 pandemic. I have conducted interviews with research participants, developed and implemented surveys for multiple populations, and conducted both quantitative and qualitative data analysis. Through my professional and personal experiences, I have seen the impact of the direct care workforce crisis for people with chronic illnesses and disabilities in the United States, and the urgency in which the country’s social and economic policies must meet this need. Through my research and practice, I aim to contribute a more nuanced and inclusive understanding of caregiving and its central role in family and social life. I believe that a deeper engagement with the lived experiences of families can inform more responsive social policies, community planning efforts, educational frameworks, and academic research agendas.