Lauren  Bigger

Lauren is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Behavioral, Social and Health Education Sciences in the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University and a Doctoral Research Assistant in the Emory Prevention Research Center. Her primary research interests are in implementation science and community-based approaches to understanding and addressing health inequities, including assessing how outer contextual factors influence policy, systems and environmental change implementation. Under the mentorship of Dr. Michelle Kegler, Lauren currently employs mixed methods approaches to evaluate the impact of a community-based rural health equity initiative and the scalability and translation of a program to promote healthy eating among low-income families. 

Lauren holds a Master's in Public Health with a focus in Urban Health from Northeastern University where she conducted qualitative research to inform best practices in the use of a clinical screening tool to address food insecurity in pediatric populations in Boston-area community health centers in partnership with Children's HealthWatch and the Boston Public Health Commission. She also holds a Bachelor and Arts in Communication of Science and Technology from Vanderbilt University. In previous roles, she has served as the Project Coordinator and Lead Research Assistant, for NIOSH and NIH funded research and as an Assistant Instructor for Northeastern University's MPH program.