Dr Ursula Henz

Ursula Henz is an Associate Professor in Social Research Methods at the Sociology Department. Prior to joining LSE, she was a researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development and Education in Berlin, Germany, at Stockholm University, Sweden, and at King's College, London.

Key expertise: Family, Life Course, Demography, Informal Caregiving, Inequality

Ursula's research has been concerned primarily with longitudinal aspects of compulsory and post-compulsory educational participation, poverty, labour market participation, family dynamics and informal caregiving using a number of large-scale surveys. Much of her work examines the interrelationships between the family and the labour market, with particular attention to gender and socio-economic inequalities.

Building on this life-course perspective, her more recent research focuses on later-life partnerships, caregiving and ageing. Current projects analyse the dynamics of intimate partnerships in later life, drawing primarily on UK longitudinal data. Alongside this strand of work, she investigates financial consequences of life-course events. Through collaborative research with the Financial Conduct Authority and as an Understanding Society Research Data Fellowship, she examines how events such as ill health, caregiving and employment transitions affect consumer credit behaviour and financial distress, using linked longitudinal survey and administrative credit data.

Ursula is part of the Social Inequalities research cluster.

Dr Henz teaches undergraduate and graduate courses on Family Diversity and Change, Family and International Migration, and Families and Inequalities.

She is currently not accepting any new PhD students.