My research is strongly multidisciplinary and focuses on how various aspects of psychological well-being are contoured by broach social structural influences such as age, gender, socioeconomic status, race/ethnicity, and culture as well as how psychological well-being changes over time as individuals negotiate their way through various challenges and life transitions. I am also interested in how well-being is linked with various of neurobiology (e.g., neural circuitry, neuroendocrine regulation, inflammatory processes, cardiovascular risk). The latter work addresses the mechanisms and pathways through which well-being may confer protection against illness and disease. Resilience is an overarching theme for putting these many levels of analysis (social structural, psychosocial, neurobiological) together. I currently directing the MIDUS (Midlife in the U.S.) national study of Americans ( www.midus.wisc.edu ), which has become a major forum for integrative, multidisciplinary studies of health and well-being.

Friedman,E.M., Hayney, M.S., Love, G.D., Urry, H.L., Rosenkranz, M.A.,
Davidson, R.J., Singer, B.L., & Ryff, C.D. (2005).  Social
relationships, sleep quality, and interluekin-6 in aging women.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 102, /18757-18762.

Ryff, C.D., Singer, B.H., & Love, G.D. (2004).  Positive health:  Connecting well-being with biology.  Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, 359, 1383-1394.

Urry, H.L., Nitschke, J.B., Dolski, I., Jackson, D.C., Dalton, K.M., Mueller, C.J., Rosenkranz, M.A., Ryff, C.D. Singer, B.H., & Davidson, R.J. (2004).  Making a life worth living:  Neural correlates of well-being.  Psychological Sciences, 6, 367-372.

Ryff, C.D., Keyes, C.L.M., & Hughes, D.L. (2003).>  Status inequalities, perceived discrimination, and eudaimonic well-being:  Do the challenges of minority life hone purpose and growth?  Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 44, 275-291.

Keyes, C.L. M., Shmotkin, D., & Ryff, C.D. (2002).Optimizing well-being:  The empirical encounter of two traditions.  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82, 1007-1022.