Mark Hayward received his PhD in Sociology at Indiana University in 1981. Along with his position as Professor of Sociology at the University of Texas, he is Centennial Commission Professor in the Liberal Arts and Director of the Population Research Center. Hayward's primary research interests center on the influence of life course exposures and events on the morbidity and mortality experiences of the older population. Presently, he is involved in several studies focusing on the origins of health disparities at older ages: early life influences on socioeconomic, race and gender disparities in adult morbidity and mortality, the demography of race/ethnic and gender disparities in healthy life expectancy; social inequality in the biomarkers of aging, and the health consequences of marriage, divorce, and widowhood. Recent publications have focused on changes in morbidity and mortality determining trends in healthy life expectancy, socioeconomic and race/ethnic differences in healthy life expectancy, the association between childhood health and adult morbidity, and the socioeconomic origins of the race gap in chronic disease morbidity. His recently published work has appeared in the American Sociological Review, Demography, the Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences, the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, and Social Science and Medicine.