Robert J. Sampson

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Robert J. Sampson
Born (1956-07-09) July 9, 1956 (age 67) [1]
Nationality American
Education University at Buffalo (BA)
University at Albany, SUNY (PhD)
Occupation Sociologist
Notable workGreat American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect

Robert J. Sampson (born July 9, 1956, [1] in Utica, New York) is the Woodford L. and Ann A. Flowers University Professor at Harvard University [2] and Director of the Social Sciences Program at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. [3] From 2005 through 2010, Sampson served as the Chair of the Department of Sociology at Harvard. [4] In 2011–2012, he was elected as the President of the American Society of Criminology. [5]

Contents

Education

Sampson received his Bachelor of Arts degree in sociology from the University at Buffalo, SUNY in 1977. He then went on to receive a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Criminal Justice from University at Albany, SUNY in 1983. [4]

Career

Sampson taught at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign from 1984 to 1991 before moving to the University of Chicago where he taught in the Department of Sociology from 1991 to 2003. As of 1994, Sampson became scientific director of the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN). [4]

Sampson was a senior research fellow at the American Bar Foundation from 1994 to 2002. [6] For the 1997–1998 and 2002–2003 academic years he was a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences in Stanford, California. [7]

In 2003, Sampson joined Harvard University where he became the Henry Ford II Professor of the Social Sciences. He also became the Founding Director of the Boston Area Research Initiative. [8]

Sampson was elected as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2005 [9] and a member of the National Academy of Sciences in 2006. [10] He was a founding co-editor of the journal the Annual Review of Criminology . [11]

Research

Sampson has published widely in the areas of crime, neighborhood effects, ecometrics, and the social organization of cities. In the area of neighborhood effects and urban studies his work has focused on race/ethnicity and social mechanisms of ecological inequality, immigration and crime, the meanings and implications of "disorder," spatial disadvantage, collective civic engagement, and other topics linked to the general idea of community-level social processes. Much of this work stems from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN). [12] [13]

Sampson published his first book in 1993, co-authored with John Laub, entitled Crime in the Making: Pathways and Turning Points Through Life. It received the Michael J. Hindelang Outstanding Book Award from the American Society of Criminology in 1994. [14] The book detailed a longitudinal study from birth to death of 1,000 disadvantaged men born in Boston during the Great Depression era. [15] Sampson built upon the research of Sheldon and Eleanor Glueck, whose records had been stored in the Harvard Law School basement. The Gluecks had interviewed young men in the 1930s: Sampson revisited the same men, now in their 60s and 70s, to gather further data about their lives. The project is the longest life-course study of criminal behavior ever conducted. It showed, among other things, that even highly active criminals can change and stop committing crimes after key turning points in life such as marriage, military service, or employment that cut connections to offending peer groups. [16]

A second book from this research, Shared Beginnings, Divergent Lives: Delinquent Boys to Age 70, published in 2003, follows up on the study by integrating personal narratives with the quantitative analysis of life-course trajectories across the seven decades in the lives of the disadvantaged subjects. [17] Shared Beginnings, Divergent Lives received the outstanding book award from the American Society of Criminology in 2004. [14]

In 2011, Sampson and fellow sociologist John Laub received the Stockholm Prize in Criminology for their achievements in the field of criminology. [16] That same year, Sampson was elected to the American Philosophical Society. [18]

In 2012, Sampson published Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect, which details his decade's worth of research on the city of Chicago. [19] [20]

Works

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References

  1. 1 2 "Sampson, Robert J. 1956- | Encyclopedia.com". www.encyclopedia.com. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  2. "Robert J. Sampson". scholar.harvard.edu. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  3. "Robert J. Sampson". Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Global Working Group (HCEO). Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  4. 1 2 3 Marino, Melissa (22 January 2008). "Profile of Robert J. Sampson". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 105 (3): 842–844. Bibcode:2008PNAS..105..842M. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0711294105 . ISSN   0027-8424. PMC   2242697 . PMID   18195369.
  5. "Officers". The American Society of Criminology. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  6. "Robert Sampson". Robert Wood Johnson Foundation - Investigator Awards in Health Policy Research. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  7. Goodchild, Michael F.; Janelle, Donald G. (15 January 2004). Spatially Integrated Social Science. Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0-19-028828-0 . Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  8. "Robert J. Sampson". sociology.fas.harvard.edu. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  9. "Robert J. Sampson". American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  10. "Robert J. Sampson". National Academy of Sciences. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  11. Petersilia, Joan; Sampson, Robert J. (2018-01-13). "Charting a Path Forward for Criminology". Annual Review of Criminology. 1 (1): i–iv. doi: 10.1146/annurev-cr-01-120717-100001 . ISSN   2572-4568.
  12. Elo, IT; Mykyta, L; Margolis, R; Culhane, JF (1 December 2009). "Perceptions of Neighborhood Disorder: The Role of Individual and Neighborhood Characteristics". Social Science Quarterly. 90 (5): 1298–1320. doi:10.1111/j.1540-6237.2009.00657.x. PMC   2822409 . PMID   20174462.
  13. "Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods | NACJD".
  14. 1 2 "Michael J. Hindelang Outstanding Book Award Recipients". The American Society of Criminology. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  15. Farrington, David P. (5 July 2017). Integrated Developmental and Life-course Theories of Offending. Routledge. ISBN   978-1-351-51222-0 . Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  16. 1 2 "John Laub and Robert Sampson Awarded Stockholm Prize". National Institute of Justice. February 16, 2011. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  17. "Crime and the Life Course". Harvard University. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  18. "APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved 2021-03-29.
  19. Johnson, Brian Edward (2013). "Review of Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect, SampsonRobert J." Urban Studies. 50 (12): 2616–2618. doi:10.1177/0042098013494246. ISSN   0042-0980. JSTOR   26145604. S2CID   187471421 . Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  20. "Sugrue and Venkatesh on Robert J. Sampson's "Great American City"". Public Books. 5 September 2012. Retrieved 1 June 2022.
  21. Sampson, Robert J. (2012). "Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect" University of Chicago Press – Chicago
  22. "Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect (Nonfiction review)". Publishers Weekly. 2 January 2012.
  23. "The Persistence of Place". Harvard Magazine. January–February 2012.
  24. J. Buntin (June 26, 2012). "Neighborhood Watch (interview with Sampson)". Governing.com . Washington, DC.


Professional and academic associations
Preceded by President of the American Society of Criminology
2012
Succeeded by