Dr. Shuang Zhao

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, Political Science

Contact

1310 Ben Graves Drive
Morton Hall
Room 201
Huntsville, AL 35899
Campus Map

256.824.2314
shuang.zhao@uah.edu

Biography

Dr. Shuang Zhao received her joint Ph.D. degree in Public Policy from the School of Public and Environmental Affairs and the Department of Political Science at Indiana University, Bloomington. Her research interests include environmental policy, international relations, and public policy. Her recent research focuses on several environmental justice topics, including how environmental harms disproportionally burden disadvantaged demographic groups and whether green buildings and schools have not benefited communities equally. Dr. Zhao uses mixed methods for her research, including econometric techniques with large datasets, survey studies and in-depth field research with focus group studies, and interviews.

Dr. Zhao's research is policy-driven pertaining to how academic research may inform real-world policies. She publishes in policy-oriented journals, such as Policy Studies Journal and Review of Policy Research. She is passionate about working with students to design their own research projects and solve real-world problems. She teaches courses in statistics, research methods, and environmental policy. Dr. Zhao is also an affiliated faculty for the Ostrom Workshop at Indiana University Bloomington, a research fellow at the Center for Organization Research and Design (CORD) at Arizona State University, and an adjunct assistant professor in the Environmental Health Sciences Department, School of Public Health, at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Curriculum Vitae

Guest opinion: Sunday was a sad Mother’s Day for Chinese Alabamians

Education

  • Ph.D., Public Policy and Political Science, Indiana University, Bloomington
  • M.P.A., Public Affairs, University of Texas at Austin
  • B.A., Economics, Beijing Technology and Business University

Expertise

  • Environmental Policy
  • International Relations
  • Public Policy

Recent Publications

  • Soto-Jiménez, Martin F., Shuang Zhao, Elena Jaffer, and Cynthia L. Jocobi-Aguilar. "Atmospheric Dry and Lead Deposition in an Arid Mexican City: Legacy of Smelting and Leaded Gasoline." Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology 90, no. 3 (2026): 16. DOI: 10.1007/s00244-026-01184-7

  • NSF 22-633 EPSCoR Research Infrastructure Improvement Program: RII FEC: Accelerating Community-Centric Energy Transformation through AI-driven Digital Twinning for Climate-Aware Resilience. 2024- 2028. 

  • Stone, B., Amiri, A., Zhao, S., Hamidi, S., Johnson, P., & Bruns, D. (2025). Food Insecurity, Walkability, and Social Determinants of Health: A Cross-Sectional, County-Level Study of Associations with Maternal and Infant Mortality in the United States. Healthcare, 13(19), 2407. https://doi.org/10.3390/healthcare13192407

    Article Link

  • Glasgow D, Rai S, Zhao S, Taylor J, Haider-Markel DP. Beyond Group Membership: New Way of Measuring Environmental Interest Group Strength in the American States. State Politics & Policy Quarterly. Published online 2025:1-23. doi:10.1017/spq.2024.30

  • Glasgow, D., Zhao, S., & Rai, S. (2021). "Rethinking Climate Change Leadership: An Analysis of the Ambitiousness of State GHG Targets." Review of Policy Research. Read the Article HERE.

  • Zhao, S., Shan Zhou. and Douglas Noonan. (2019) 'Environmental Justice and Green Schools—Assessing Students and Communities' Access to Green Schools', Social Science Quarterly. 100(6). pp.2223-2239. doi: 10.1111/ssqu.12715.

  • Amiri, A. and Shuang Zhao (2019) 'Environmental justice screening tools: Implications for nursing', Public Health Nursing. 36(3), pp. 411–421. doi: 10.1111/phn.12593.

  • Castner, J., Azita Amiri, Jeannie Rodriguez, Luz Huntington-Moskos, Shuang Zhao,and Barbara Polivka (2019) 'Advancing the symptom science model with environmental health', Public Health Nursing. doi: 10.1111/phn.12641.

  • Amiri, A. and Shuang Zhao(2019) 'Working with an environmental justice community: Nurse observation, assessment, and intervention', Nursing Forum. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd (10.1111), 54(2), pp. 270–279. doi: 10.1111/nuf.12327.

  • Kaulfus, A., Alexander, S., Zhao, S., O'Keefe, L., Oster, R., Bartlucci, A.. (2017) 'The Inherent Challenges of Using Large Data Sets in Healthcare Research: Experiences of an Interdisciplinary Team.', Computers, informatics, nursing: CIN.NIH Public Access, 35(5), pp. 221–225. doi: 10.1097/CIN.0000000000000359.