Catherine Porter is a Senior Lecturer at Lancaster University Economics Department and a senior advisor to the Young Lives Project in Oxford University.  Her research interests in applied microeconomics include the effects of risk and shocks on the lives of poor people; skills development through childhood and adolescence; inequality and poverty measurement and the effects of policies on welfare. She also seeks to understand the effects of role models on motivation and behaviour. She has worked in Ethiopia, The Gambia, India, Peru, Uganda and Vietnam and is also involved in projects in Somalia and South Sudan. 

Three selected publications:

Gender differences in the choice of major: The importance of female role models (co-author Serra, D.) 
American Economic Journal: Applied Economics ,  12 (3), 226-54

Reinforcement or compensation? Parental responses to children’s revealed human capital levels (co-author Fan, W.)  
Journal of Population Economics ,  33 (1), 233-270

Young lives, interrupted: Short‑term effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on adolescents in low- and middle-income countries (co-authors Favara, M., Freund, R., Sánchez, A. and Scott, D.) 
Covid Economics, 67: 172-198