Dawn C. Carr MGS, Ph.D.

About

Dawn C. Carr, Ph.D., is an assistant professor at Florida State University in the Department of Sociology and the Pepper Center for Aging and Social Change. Carr’s expertise lies in understanding the factors that bolster older adults’ ability to remain healthy and active as long as possible. With Kathrin Komp, Carr published “Gerontology in the Era of the Third Age: Implications and Next Steps” in 2011, a text dedicated to exploring the relevance, purpose, and factors that contributed to the emergence of a new period of life following one’s career but prior to onset of frailty in later life. Her recent work focuses on understanding the complex pathways between health and active engagement during later life, including the impact of key transitions in health, productivity, and caregiving. Before joining Florida State University in 2016, she was a researcher at the Stanford Center on Longevity, a postdoctoral fellow in the Carolina Program for Health and Aging Research (CPHAR) at the Institute on Aging at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and a researcher at Scripps Gerontology Center. Carr received her Ph.D. in Social Gerontology and Master’s in Gerontological Studies at Miami University, and Bachelor of Arts in Music Performance at Arizona State University.

Books by Dawn C. Carr MGS, Ph.D.

Recent Posts

Why Young People Should Care About Aging

Young adults still view aging issues as largely irrelevant in their lives. All young people today should be planning for their lives to last nine decades.

Whatever Doesn't Kill You, Will Only Make You Stronger?

When bad stuff happens to resilient people, it appears that in the short-term they don’t do anything different from what nonresilient people do. Instead, they feel something different about their ability to handle things. And as a result, they fare better physically and psychologically over the long-term.

Want to Live Longer? Make Good Friends.

It may be surprising, but who you choose as a friend matters, and so does the quality of those friendships. Good relationships have a potent beneficial impact on your health.

Why We Should All Be More Suspicious

At a time when aging and health research is splashed all over the news on a daily basis, it is now more than ever important to be cautious about jumping on the bandwagon with "research-based" expertise offered by the media.

What It Means to Live a Good Life

Although we tend to be more drawn to opportunities that benefit future generations as we get older, we can and should consider how we are living our lives now, and how we matter to others well before we ever reach old age or experience a life threatening situation.

Why You Should Stop Worrying So Much About What You Eat

Just because we don't yet know whether broccoli or Brussels sprouts have a more potent benefit to our health and longevity, we know enough about lifestyle behaviors to make better decisions than most of us are currently making when it comes to nutrition.

Use It or Lose It!

For several decades, people have used the term "use it or lose it" to aptly describe the best way to off-set the problems that come with aging. As overly simplistic as the idea sounds, scientific studies continue to show that if you disengage in later life, things fall apart. This has particular relevance when we're talking about cognitive performance.

5 Reasons Why You Should Volunteer

Only about one in four adults volunteer today, and only a small fraction of them do so on a regular basis.

How Old Are You, Really? And Does It Matter?

Chronological age doesn't mean what it used to, but what is an alternative metric that could be more meaningful?