Qianxia Jiang has an interdisciplinary background in obesity prevention and intervention, psychology, health equity, and agricultural economics. She plans to graduate with her Ph.D. in May 2022. She is interested in the factors that contribute to obesity-related disparity and inequities, including the influences of built environments on health risks in marginalized groups, and applying this knowledge to inform interventions to promote healthy living. Qianxia first discovered her passion for obesity research as an undergraduate when she conducted research assessing how a food selection inhibitory control training game of children’s response inhibition affected eating behavior.
Qianxia has worked with professors from different departments on multiple projects at UConn. She conducts both quantitative and qualitative research with her advisor, Dr. Kim Gans, on an NIH-funded evaluation study of a multicomponent intervention that supports and empowers family childcare providers to improve the food and physical activity environments in their homes. She first learned about health equity and policy research by working with Allied Health professor Dr. Kristen Cooksey Stowers on multiple studies related to built food environments, disparities in food insecurity status, health quality, diet quality, and weight status. Beginning last summer, Qianxia was involved in an interdisciplinary grant that examines the association between the changing market structure and health outcomes. She also examined how changes in food retail market concentration relate to racial and ethnic inequities in food access over time. Qianxia has published several peer-reviewed publications and presented her research at both international and national conferences.
Following graduation, Qianxia will become a postdoctoral scholar at the Center for Children’s Healthy Lifestyles and Nutrition, Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, Missouri. This fellowship opportunity will provide training in novel ways to measure physical activity, behavioral epidemiology, and implementation science.
In her spare time, Qianxia loves hiking, snorkeling, kayaking, and traveling. She plans to get advanced open water certificate in Hawaii this year. She has two cats (Tiger and Coyote).