Rate My Professor Leah Ruppanner

Ruppanner's research investigates gender and its intersections with inequalities, technologies, and policies, particularly unpaid cognitive and emotional labor (mental load), housework, childcare, sleep, well-being, and women's employment trajectories, including during COVID-19. She authored the book Motherlands: How States Push Mothers Out of Employment (Temple University Press, 2020). Select peer-reviewed publications include “School Reopenings During the COVID-19 Pandemic and Implications for Gender and Racial Equity” (Demography, 2022, with Landivar, Scarborough, Collins et al.), “The mental load: building a deeper theoretical understanding of how cognitive and emotional labor overload women and mothers” (Community, Work & Family, 2022, with Dean and Churchill), and “How do Gender Norms and Childcare Costs Affect Maternal Employment Across US States” (Gender & Society, 2021, with Collins, Landivar, and Scarborough). Her research has garnered significant funding, such as the ARC Future Fellowship for “The Consequences of the Mental Load for Australian families” (2023-2026, $1.18 million), ARC DECRA for “Family Well-Being: The Role of Public Policy” (2015, $372,000), ARC Discovery for “Enhancing Sleep and Well-Being in Working Families” (2018-2021, $242,944), and others. Publications appear in premier outlets like Demography, Journal of Marriage and Family, European Sociological Review, and Social Science Research. Ruppanner enjoys extensive media engagement in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Guardian, and hosts the MissPerceived podcast.