Research Assistant supporting social science research initiatives at Vanderbilt University. Involves assisting with study procedures, data collection, and collaboration with research teams.
About the role
- Senior Research Scientist driving Surgo’s Maternal Health Taskforce, leading analyses and insights for impactful healthcare decisions. Collaborating with teams to shape real-world maternal health strategies.
Responsibilities
- Lead Scientific Design & Analytical Strategy
- Design and oversee the research strategy and analytical roadmap for the US Maternal Health Task Force (together with our advisory board), including survey research, narrative analysis, quantitative modeling, segmentation, and triangulation across data sources.
- Identify opportunities to advance the science, in particular leveraging natural language processing (NLP), large language models (LLMs), causal inference, and AI–based methods for analyzing both quantitative and qualitative data.
- Conduct & Oversee Advanced Analyses
- Conduct rigorous literature reviews and lead the development of behavioral-science-informed research instruments, using Surgo’s LLM-powered tools combined with geospatial data.
- Lead high-complexity analyses on maternal health, wellbeing, behavioral drivers, and system-level factors affecting US pregnant people.
- Build and validate models for analyzing structured and unstructured data.
- Apply strong inferential and statistical reasoning to ensure our insights are scientifically sound and grounded in evidence across multiple datasets.
- Analyze data generated from conversational AI tools used with mothers (e.g., structured dialogues, open-text responses, narrative prompts), ensuring rigorous methodological handling, bias assessment, and validity checks.
- Generate High-Impact Insights & Recommendations
- Translate analytical outputs into crisp, actionable insights that funders, policymakers, and service providers can understand and use.
- Co-develop strategic recommendations based on evidence, showing not just what the data says, but what should happen next.
- Produce compelling materials (reports, slide decks, briefs, press releases) that elevate evidence while remaining accessible.
- Guide Partner Engagement & Adoption
- Collaborate closely with US-based partners including funders, public sector organizations, policy makers, advocacy groups to ensure insights meet real needs.
- Support partners in integrating findings into policies, service models, and implementation plans that improve maternal health.
- Advance Surgo’s Scientific & Product Portfolio
- Contribute to Surgo’s growing portfolio in maternal health.
- Identify scientific and methodological innovations that can strengthen Surgo’s products and tools, including novel applications of LLMs, narrative analytics, and AI-driven measurement.
- Support proposal development and pitches by bringing deep subject-matter and methodological expertise.
Requirements
- 4+ years of experience in applied research, public health, maternal health, epidemiology, behavioural science, data science, or a related field.
- Advanced degree (PhD strongly preferred; Master’s considered with significant experience).
- Deep familiarity with the US youth maternal health data landscape and relationships with key actors.
- Demonstrated experience working with complex maternal health datasets, including survey data, and qualitative or narrative data.
- You are highly experienced in R and/or Python, and are experienced in / eager to learn Databricks.
- Strong technical and methodological expertise, including research design, measurement, and advanced analytical techniques.
- Detail-oriented with excellent research validation skills, able to spot inconsistencies, errors, and methodological gaps.
- Able to implement and uphold rigorous scientific processes, serving as a methodological steward accountable for strong QA, transparent workflows, and high-quality outputs.
- Statistical and methodological expertise in analyzing qualitative data and transforming it into quantitative insights, including coding frameworks, embeddings, clustering, model-based text analysis, and mixed-methods integration.
- Comfortable managing the full analytical workflow—from instrument design to modelling to interpretation—with a strong commitment to accuracy, transparency, and scientific integrity.
Benefits
- Fantastic, fun and collaborative colleagues; opportunity to solve tough challenges in healthcare
- Ability to be entrepreneurial and tremendous opportunities for growth
- Public Benefit Corporation with an impact and equity mission
- Competitive compensation and health benefits
- Generous PTO, 10+ holidays
- Highly competitive 401K
- Professional Development opportunities
Job title
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