About

Christie Sennott is a Professor of Sociology at Purdue University within the College of Liberal Arts. She holds a Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Colorado (2013) and an M.A. in Sociology from the University of Missouri (2004). Her research addresses the social, cultural, and structural factors that influence sexual and reproductive health, fertility desires and decision-making, maternal and child health, and gender inequality across global contexts. Dr. Sennott is skilled in both qualitative and quantitative data analysis, and her research is multi-method, collaborative, and global in scope, with studies conducted in high-income countries such as the United States and South Korea, as well as in low- and middle-income countries including South Africa, Malawi, and India. She has received support for her work through various fellowships and grants from organizations such as the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Institute of International Education, the American Association of University Women, and the National Institutes of Health. Her research has been published in high-impact journals including Demography, Social Problems, Journal of Marriage and Family, Gender & Society, and Population and Development Review. Dr. Sennott has been recognized with awards for her research and teaching, including the Excellence in Discovery and Creative Endeavors Award, the Kenneth T. Kofmehl Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching Award from Purdue's College of Liberal Arts, the Burkhart Award for Excellence in Family Research, and the Clifford B. Kinley Trust Grant Award. Currently, she serves as the Principal Investigator on an R21 Exploratory/Developmental Grant funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, titled 'Reproductive Healthcare Deserts and Maternal and Infant Health.' As part of this project, she and her team developed the Reproductive Healthcare Desert (RHD) Dashboard, an online resource documenting access to reproductive healthcare at the U.S. county level and changes since 2010.

Research topics

• Political Science
• Sociology
• Gender studies
• Environmental health
• Law
• Obstetrics
• Biology
• Family medicine
• Medicine
• Psychology
• Economic growth
• Pediatrics
• Psychoanalysis
• Social psychology
• Economics

Selected publications

• Avoidance, awareness, or acceptance: Parental communication about sexual and reproductive health and college women's contraceptive behaviors

  SSM - Qualitative Research in Health · 2026-01-13 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Emerging adulthood is characterized by heightened risks to unwanted sexual and reproductive health (SRH) outcomes, particularly for young women. In the U.S., school-based sexual education programs often prioritize abstinence, leaving youth without comprehensive information on avoiding pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections. In this context, parental communication about SRH is vital to increase SRH knowledge and contraceptive autonomy. However, we lack information about how parental beliefs and parent-child communication about SRH during adolescence may influence young women’s contraceptive behaviors during emerging adulthood. Therefore, we analyze 57 in-depth interviews with women attending a midwestern U.S. university to document parental SRH communication strategies, the beliefs or logics underlying these strategies, parental provision of contraception during high school, and the implications for women’s contraceptive behaviors in college. In the avoidance strategy, parents avoided discussing SRH and did not provide contraceptive access largely due to religious beliefs. In the awareness strategy, parents indirectly communicated about SRH and often put daughters on contraception to address menstruation-related symptoms. Logics in this group varied from religious opposition to practical support. In the acceptance strategy, parents talked openly about SRH, used a practical support logic, and provided access to birth control for pregnancy prevention. College women in the avoidance category were more likely than others to have unprotected sex, rely on less-effective methods, and use emergency contraception. Discussing SRH issues and providing daughters access to contraception when needed is an important way parents can ensure daughters have the knowledge and tools to avoid unwanted SRH outcomes during emerging adulthood.

  PublisherDOI

• Event-Centered Interviewing: Integrating Qualitative Interviews with Experience Sampling Technologies

  Sociological Methodology · 2024-09-28 · 2 citations

  articleSenior author

  The qualitative interview has been a core technique in the sociological methods toolkit for generations. Interviews provide essential insights into how participants experience the world around them. New opportunities have emerged to adapt traditional in-depth interview techniques through the use of evolving technologies available to interview participants. This article describes the integration of ecological momentary assessment techniques to augment qualitative in-depth interviews focused on specific events, which we term event-centered interviewing. By incorporating photo data captured systematically through smartphone apps designed for ecological momentary assessment, event-centered interviews can extend the strengths of traditional qualitative interviews. We describe the processes and procedures for conducting event-centered interviews, and we highlight how the approach may create opportunities for qualitative analysis and minimize certain limitations of traditional in-depth interviews. We also highlight the positive participant responses to the approach from a pilot study. Although traditional in-depth interviews may remain at the core of qualitative sociological inquiry, event-centered interviewing may be especially useful for interviews about behavior and experiences that occur during specific events.

  PublisherDOI

• Fertility Desires and Contraceptive Transition

  Population and Development Review · 2024-10-06 · 2 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Fertility desires are fundamental to understanding contraceptive use, yet the relationship between the two remains unclear and is the subject of much debate in demography. To understand the macro-level relationship between fertility desires and contraceptive transition in low- and middle-income countries, we introduce a conceptual model that articulates the micro-level processes through which a desire to avoid childbearing translates into contraceptive use and reasons for their frequent misalignment. The model calls for a more nuanced understanding of fertility desires, differentiates between the acceptability and accessibility of contraception, and highlights the multilevel forces that shape the costs of fertility regulation. These micro-level processes are key to understanding the evolving role of changes in fertility desires and changes in the implementation of desires on contraceptive transition across time and space. We conclude these relationships are additive, multiplicative, and dynamic over time.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Relationship Dynamics and Young Women’s Contraceptive Use

  Sexuality Research and Social Policy · 2024-12-12 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Korean mothers’ career aspirations in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic: a longitudinal qualitative study

  Longitudinal and Life Course Studies · 2023-02-01 · 5 citations

  articleSenior author

  Working mothers face challenges in pursuing their career aspirations due to work-family conflict. The recent COVID-19 pandemic has posed added challenges for working mothers by increasing care demands while also causing numerous health, economic and social disruptions. In this paper, we examine the impact of COVID-19 on Korean working mothers' career aspirations. We employ a longitudinal qualitative design by analysing 64 in-depth interviews with 32 mothers of young children in South Korea. By interviewing the same women before (2019) and during the COVID-19 pandemic (2020), we are able to document how working mothers' career aspirations were impacted by COVID-19. Findings show that all working mothers in the sample experienced increased care demands due to COVID-19. However, the influence of COVID-19 on working mothers' career aspirations hinged on gendered beliefs related to childcare responsibility. When working mothers believed or were subjected to beliefs that mothers should be the primary caregiver for children (gendered care belief), their career aspirations were tempered or relinquished. On the other hand, those who believed that mothers should not be held solely responsible for childcare (gender egalitarian care belief) continued to pursue their career aspirations or experienced career advancements during COVID-19. Findings suggest that beliefs related to care responsibilities play an important role in working mothers' pursuit of their career aspirations, and potentially their future careers.

  PublisherDOI

• A partner‐specific critique of mistimed and unwanted fertility: Results from an analysis of the 2017–2019 United States National Survey of Family Growth

  Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health · 2023-07-02 · 1 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  CONTEXT: Despite substantial critiques of retrospective measures of fertility intentions, researchers widely use the metrics of unwanted and mistimed pregnancies as tools for monitoring patterns and trends in reproductive health. However, in focusing exclusively on the timing and numeric elements of fertility these constructs ignore partner-specific desires, which may lead to considerable measurement error and threaten their validity. METHODOLOGY: We use data on births in the last 5 years from the 2017-2019 United States National Survey of Family Growth to compare responses to the standard retrospective measure of fertility intentions with responses to a partner-specific question that asks respondents about whether they had ever desired a child with that partner. RESULTS: We find that women's responses to questions on retrospective fertility desires with and without reference to a particular partner vary in ways that suggest that women and researchers interpret these questions differently. DISCUSSION: Despite a long history in fertility research, the standard approach to measuring mistimed and unwanted fertility is both conceptually and operationally flawed. In the context of complicated sexual and reproductive lives that do not start and end with a single partner, researchers should reevaluate the usefulness of the constructs of mistimed and unwanted fertility. We conclude by offering recommendations for analysts and survey designers as well as by calling for a move away from the terms entirely to focus instead on the pregnancies that women themselves view as most problematic.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Doing and Redoing Emphasized Femininity: How Women Use Emotion Work to Manage Competing Expectations in College Hookup Culture

  Sex Roles · 2022 · 12 citations

  • Sociology
  • Psychology
  • Social psychology
  PublisherDOI

• Norms, Trust, and Backup Plans: U.S. College Women’s Use of Withdrawal with Casual and Committed Romantic Partners

  The Journal of Sex Research · 2022-02-24 · 5 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  This study integrates research on contraceptive prevalence with research on contraceptive dynamics in hookup culture to examine college women's use of withdrawal with sexual partners. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 57 women at a midwestern U.S. university, we analyzed women's explanations for using withdrawal for pregnancy prevention and framed our study within the research on gender norms, sexual scripts, and power dynamics. Findings showed withdrawal was normalized within collegiate hookup culture, and that women frequently relied on withdrawal as a secondary or backup method or when switching between methods. Women often followed up with emergency contraceptives if using withdrawal alone. With casual partners, women advocated for their own preferences, including for partners to withdraw. In committed relationships, women prioritized their partner's desires for condomless sex, but also linked withdrawal with trust and love. Thus, women in relationships may be disadvantaged by hookup culture norms suggesting sex is freely available, putting pressure on them to acquiesce to withdrawal. Many women used withdrawal despite acknowledging it was not the most desirable or effective method, emphasizing the need for a sexual health approach that acknowledges these tensions and strives to help women and their partners safely meet their sexual and contraceptive preferences.

  PublisherDOI

• The Liberalization of Cannabis Possession Laws and Birth Outcomes: A State-Level Fixed Effects Analysis, 2003–2019

  Population Research and Policy Review · 2022-04-11

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Rights vs. Lived Realities: Women’s Views of Gender Equality in Relationships in Rural South Africa

  Social Problems · 2022-02-16 · 4 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  South Africa's Constitution is among the world's most ambitious in promoting gender equality, but the country continues to be marked by inequality and gender-based violence. Given this context, we analyze 43 interviews with Black women aged 18-55 in rural South Africa to explore how the constitutional ideal of gender equality-or "50/50"-has been interpreted and applied in women's intimate relationships. Overall, we found that inequality and gender hierarchy were common in relationships. Women relied on two logics to explain the persistence of inequality in their relationships. First, women offered ideological support for gender norms supporting hierarchy by linking 50/50 to the abandonment of culture, tradition, and respect. Second, women viewed reaffirmation of gender inequality within relationships as a pragmatic way to avoid men's violence and infidelity, thus protecting women from abandonment and HIV. Women's views about equality in relationships were shaped by dominant gender norms, precarity in the local political economy, and the risks of violence and HIV/AIDS. Our findings expand theories of social change by highlighting how not only longstanding social norms, but also local political-economic and health conditions can influence views of equality and ultimately the local adoption or dismissal of international standards of rights and equality.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Sara Yeatman

  University of Colorado Denver

  23 shared

• Nicole Angotti

  American University

  19 shared

• Sangeetha Madhavan

  University of Maryland, College Park

  16 shared

• Enid Schatz

  University of Missouri

  16 shared

• Laurie James‐Hawkins

  4 shared

• Stefanie Mollborn

  Stockholm University

  4 shared

• Sanyu A. Mojola

  Princeton University

  3 shared

• Abigail Harrison

  Brown University

  3 shared

Awards & honors

• Excellence in Discovery and Creative Endeavors Award
• Kenneth T. Kofmehl Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching Award…
• Burkhart Award for Excellence in Family Research from the Ce…
• Clifford B. Kinley Trust Grant Award (Purdue)
• Reproductive Healthcare Desert (RHD) Dashboard development