Kate Burrows

Kate is a PhD candidate at Yale University where she studies climate change and health. Prior to beginning at Yale, Kate received her MPH from Columbia University (2016) where she wrote her thesis on the link between climate change, displacement, and conflict. During this time, Kate also worked at the American Museum of Natural History, where she studied how local indicators that capture both socio-cultural and ecological dimensions of resilience can be scaled to the global level. Kate has also held research positions at the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York, NY, and the International Center for Migration, Health, and Development in Geneva, Switzerland where she worked on projects related to global food systems, urbanization and health, refugee studies, and climate change. In 2019, Kate was named a National Geographic Explorer.  

Kate is particularly interested in the relationship between the environment, human migration, and mental health. Her dissertation work is based in Indonesia and explores the effect of displacement on the relationship between landslides and mental health outcomes. Kate is trained in quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis, and she employs a mixed-methods approach in her research. Her dissertation work is driven by community-based participation and draws on the fields of sociology, demography, and public health, as well as on local knowledge.