Barry M. Popkin

Barry M. Popkin, Professor of Nutrition at UNC-CH, is an economist studying the determinants and consequences of nutritional, health, and demographic behaviors and their interrelationships. He heads the Nutrition department's Division of Nutrition Epidemiology. He has a special interest in nutrition and aging as it relates to dietary and body composition trends and determinants, particularly the demographic and economic determinants of dietary and body composition trends. Popkin has an active US research program in understanding dietary behavior with a focus on eating patterns, trends, and sociodemographic determinants. He also does long-term research on the nutrition transition in several countries. This includes detailed longitudinal studies that he directs in China and Russia, active involvement with longitudinal studies in the Philippines and South Africa, and related work in a number of countries. Each longitudinal survey includes a large subpopulation of persons older than age 60, and indepth data are collected on healthy aging issues (Activities of Daily Living, Instrumental Activities of Daily Living, cognition); intrahousehold, intergenerational transfers; and other sociodemographic attributes. He is a member of a large number of US and international scientific advisory groups and heads an international committee related to the nutrition transition.