I am a Professor and Next Generation Program Scholar at Georgia State University in the Department of CJ and Criminology and a faculty affiliate of the GSU Center for Research on Interpersonal Violence (CRIV). I am also an external affiliate of the Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology (CSDE) at the University of Washington, where previously I was an assistant to associate professor in the Department of Sociology. From 2019 to 2024, I trained in genomics, statistical genetics, and epigenetics with a fellowship from the NIH Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD). In professional service roles, I recently finished terms as an associate editor of Criminology and an executive counselor for the American Society of Criminology, and I currently serve on the editorial boards of Demography, Theory and Society, and Dignity.
My areas of interest include crime and inequality; criminological theories, especially developmental and life-course criminology; racial disparities in crime and health-risk behaviors; sex, gender, crime, law, & society; social science genetics; and meta-science.
Much of my work has focused on explaining disparities in crime and health-risk behaviors. I seek to explain why some people who face challenging life circumstances (poverty, abuse, discrimination, dangerous environments) often respond in ways that seem to exacerbate their situations. My research is motivated by the desire to understand how experiences of social adversity, profoundly shaped by social position, influence development and behavior, focusing on psychosocial orientations that induce “choices” shaping short-sighted behavior and perpetuating inequalities.
In this line of work, I have examined a number of social risk and protective factors for criminal and health-risk behaviors, including racial discrimination, racial socialization, supportive parenting, community crime, and deviant peers. A related line of research focuses on stability and change in psychosocial schemas associated with health-risk and reckless behaviors in adolescence and emerging adulthood. For example, in a 2017 study published in Criminology, I developed and tested a life-course model illuminating the individual mechanisms and social pathways through which childhood exposure increases the risk of adult crime while highlighting the enduring protective effects of familial racial socialization. Earlier works explored these processes in adolescence (American Sociological Review, 2012), investigated the individual mechanisms through which racial socialization buffers the effects of crime (Social Problems, 2017), and examined sex/gender differences in these processes (Justice Quarterly, 2015). In other research, I explore the development, stability, and effects of social factors and interventions on self-control processes and their relationship to crime.
In prior solo and collaborative work, I have debated the merits of heritability studies in sociology, discussed gene-environment interplay, and future directions for biopsychosocial scholarship. With the support of a Mentored Research Scientist Development K01 award from NICHD (2018-2023), I studied genomics in order to incorporate gene-environment interplay into my research. In several recently published pieces, I have explored the complexities of polygenic scores (PGSs) and the challenges accompanying their use in social science.
I have a longstanding interest in socio-legal issues around sex and gender, with a particular interest in how gender – as a set of social norms imposed on male and female bodies – limits the full humanity of males and females and constrains female bodies in subordinate (caregiving, passive) roles. In my first research project, which started as an undergrad with one of my mentors as the lead, we examined how rape law reforms influenced rape reporting over time. In my master’s thesis, I examined how gender norms influence sex differences in responses to stress and the sex gap in delinquency. In recent years, I have scrutinized the science around sex, gender, and gender identity, as well as proposed policy changes that would eliminate distinctions between sex and gender identity in the law.
Finally, I also maintain a broad research program in philosophy of science and meta-science aimed at assessing and strengthening scientific rigor. This work examines how assumptions, measurement practices, institutional incentives, and epistemic norms shape the production and interpretation of evidence across the social sciences. One line of this program focuses on the consequences of ideological homogeneity for scientific inference; my forthcoming Theory & Society article, Ideological Homogeneity and Its Epistemic Discontents: A Case Study of Research on Transgender Issues, analyzes how shared frameworks can introduce systematic distortions and impede error correction. Notably, my interest in science studies is not of the deconstructionist type but of the skeptical, attentive, debunking, precise, “getting-closer-to-the-facts” type, which is, in my view, what science is about. As Rauch (1993) observes: “if you do not try to check ideas by trying to debunk them, you are not practicing science.”
My scholarship has been published in various outlets, including the American Journal of Sociology, American Sociological Review, Annual Review of Criminology, Behavioral and Brain Sciences, Criminology, Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Justice Quarterly, PLOS Biology, Social Forces, Social Problems, Sociological Methodology, Theory and Society, among others. In 2014, I was awarded the Ruth Shonle Cavan “Young Scholar” Award from the American Society of Criminology.
Somewhat recently, I was interviewed about my criminology research on The Criminology Academy podcast, which can be found here (and other places where you find podcasts). On the Sage Sociology podcast, I discussed a 2024 article on polygenic scores for social science in Sociological Methodology, which can be found here.
You can find me on Twitter @calliehburt
Select Recent Research, Teaching, and Service Activities (2025)
Research and Scholarly Work (2025) – see publications page for manuscript links.
• Ideological Homogeneity and its Epistemic Discontents: A Case Study of Research on Transgender Issues. Theory & Society (accepted September 2025).
• Heterogeneity in Violent Crime Victimization within the LGBT Population: Estimates from the U.S. National Crime Victimization Survey. Criminology (accepted April 2025), with graduate student Caitlin Dorsch.
• The Post-Truth Myth and the Crisis of Credibility. The Criminologist (accepted October 2025).
Invited Presentations
• The Promise and Perils of Polygenic Scores: A Critical Examination for Social Science Research. University of Minnesota, Center for the Philosophy of Science, 21 March 2025.
Research Grants
• Advancing Sociogenomic Research on Gene–Environment Interplay and Population Health (R01), National Institutes of Health (NICHD). Principal Investigator, 2026–2031. $2,371,160. Submitted October 2025.
Teaching (2025)
Fall 2025
• Introduction to Criminal Justice (CRJU 1100) — 146 students
• Criminological Theory (CRJU 3410) — 74 students
Spring 2025
• Introduction to Criminal Justice (CRJU 1100) — 90 students
• Criminological Theory (CRJU 3410) — 60 students
Professional and University Service (2025)
• College Promotion & Tenure Committee
• Department Executive Committee
• Executive Counselor, American Society of Criminology (term completed Nov. 2025)
• Associate Editor, Criminology (January 2024 – July 2025)
• Editorial Boards: Demography, Dignity, Theory & Society
Callie H. Burt, Ph.D. 