A member of the Department of Sociology, Hans-Peter Kohler is also a research associate in the Population Studies Center at Penn and Chair of the graduate group in demography. Kohler’s primary research focuses on fertility and health-related behaviors in developing and developed countries. A key characteristic of this research is the attempt to integrate demographic, economic, sociological, and biological approaches in empirical and theoretical models of demographic behavior. For example, Kohler has been investigating aspects of the bio-social determinants of fertility, the determinants of low- and lowest-low fertility in Southern and Eastern Europe, the causal effects of education on health, the interrelations between marriage and sexual relations in developing countries, and the role of social interaction processes for fertility and AIDS-related behaviors. He is the author of a recent book on fertility and social interaction, has co-edited a book on the biodemography of human reproduction and fertility, and is widely published in leading journals on topics related to fertility, health, social and sexual networks, HIV/AIDS, biodemography and well-being.

Kohler received his master’s degree in demography and his doctorate in economics from the University of California at Berkeley. He came to Penn as an associate professor of sociology in 2003, and in 2005 he earned the Clifford C. Clogg Award for Early Career Achievement from the Population Association of America. He has also been honored with the Otis Dudley Duncan Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Social Demography by the American Sociological Association. He is president of the Society of Biodemography and Social Biology, and sits on the editorial boards of Demography, Social Forces, and Advances in Life Course Research. He has been a recent fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies at the Norwegian Academy and is currently a fellow at the Carlo F. Dondena Center for Research on Social Dynamics at Bocconi University in Milan, Italy.