Research Associate, Bennett Institute for Public Policy

Pepita is a Research Associate at the Bennett Institute for Public Policy. Her primary research interest is in the political economy of health and well-being: how politics and economics ‘get under the skin’ to impact peoples’ opportunities for living healthy lives. Her previous work in this area used quasi-experimental methods and new data to study the health impacts of trade policies and labour market reforms. In other work she has investigated how behavioural economic traits influence the effectiveness of public health interventions targeting the prevention of unhealthy behaviours, such as smoking.

Pepita’s research has been published in various international academic outlets, including Social Science & Medicine, PLOS Medicine, and International Journal of Epidemiology, among others. Her work has also featured in The Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Financial Times, The Guardian, CBC, and El País. For a full list of Pepita's most recent publications, see her Google Scholar page here.

Before joining the Bennett Institute Pepita completed a DPhil (PhD) in Sociology at Nuffield College, University of Oxford, an MSc in Sociology, also at Oxford, and a BSc in Economics with Economic History at the London School of Economics (LSE). She also worked briefly at the Institute for Government and the LSE, and has served as a scientific adviser to the World Health Organization.