Patrick Sharkey will join NYUs Department of Sociology and the Wagner School of Public Service in the Fall of 2007, after completing his doctoral degree in Sociology and Social Policy at Harvard. He has published in academic outlets including the American Sociological Review, the Journal of Policy Analysis and
Management, the American Review of Public Administration, and the Journal of Black Studies.
His research focuses on various issues related to inequality in urban neighborhoods. One strand of research seeks to describe and explain the persistence of neighborhood inequality in Americas cities, and the mechanisms by which this inequality persists over time and across generations of family members. A second strand of his work focuses on the consequences of persistent neighborhood inequality for the life chances of individuals from different racial and ethnic groups in America. This research involves incorporating the neighborhood environment into empirical models of economic and social mobility, and estimating the cumulative influence of neighborhoods on adolescent developmental outcomes. Sharkey has published research examining how aspects of the neighborhood environment influence the choices that adolescents make as they navigate potentially violent streets, and his current work focuses on the
relationship between long-term neighborhood disadvantage and individual cognitive development, violent behavior, and victimization.