About the Director: Brad Wilcox
Brad Wilcox is Director of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia, Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Virginia, and a member of the James Madison Society at Princeton University.
He earned his undergraduate degree at the University of Virginia and his Ph.D. at Princeton University. Prior to coming to the University of Virginia, he held research fellowships at Princeton University, Yale University and the Brookings Institution.
Brad Wilcox’s research focuses on marriage, parenthood, and cohabitation, especially on the ways that marriage, gender, and culture influence the quality and stability of family life in the United States and around the globe. He is the coauthor of Gender and Parenthood: Biological and Social Scientific Perspectives (Columbia, 2013, with Kathleen Kovner Kline), Whither the Child?: Causes and Consequences of Low Fertility (Paradigm, 2013, with Eric Kaufmann), and the author of Soft Patriarchs, New Men: How Christianity Shapes Fathers and Husbands (Chicago, 2004). Wilcox has published articles on marriage, cohabitation, parenting, and fatherhood in The American Sociological Review, Social Forces, The Journal of Marriage and Family and The Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. Wilcox is now writing a book with Nicholas Wolfinger titled, Soul Mates: Religion, Sex, Children, & Marriage among African Americans and Latinos (Oxford 2013).
Brad Wilcox has received the following two awards from the American Sociological Association Religion Section for his research: the Best Graduate Paper Award and the Best Article Award. His research has also been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, BBC News, The Atlantic, The Washington Post, USA Today, The Boston Globe, CNN, The Los Angeles Times, CBS News, NBC’s The Today Show, and on NPR. He also writes regularly for publications like The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.
Brad Wilcox teaches courses in statistics, family, and religion.
For more on his academic research, see:
For his recent popular writings, see:
- How To Keep Parenthood from Making Your Marriage Miserable
- Closing the book on open marriage
- Marriage: The Next Chapter
- Sex and the married American
- Why the Ring Matters
- The Generation That Can’t Move On Up
- Daddy Was Only a Donor
- Can the Recession Save Marriage?
- A Shaky Foundation for Families
Working Papers:
Follow Brad Wilcox on Twitter @WilcoxNMP

