Dr. Holmes Finch

Ball State University

The Covid-19 pandemic, which began in China in late 2019, and subsequently spread across the world during the first several months of 2020, has had a dramatic impact on all facets of life.  At the same time, it has not manifested in the same way in every nation.  Some countries experienced a large initial spike in cases and deaths, followed by a rapid decline, whereas others had relatively low rates of both outcomes throughout the first half of 2020.  The United States experienced a unique pattern of the virus, with a large initial spike, followed by a moderate decline in cases, with a second, and then third spike following that.  In addition, research has shown that in the U.S. the severity of the pandemic has been associated with poverty and access to health care services.  The purpose of this study was to investigate whether the course of the pandemic has been uniform across America, and if not how it differed, particularly with respect to poverty.  Results of a mixture random intercept multilevel model revealed that the pandemic followed four distinct paths in the country, representing differences with respect to poverty and growth in the number of cases.  Follow up analyses revealed further differences across the U.S. in terms of the pandemic trajectory and demographic, employment, rural/urban, and health care variables.  Implications of these findings and directions for future research are discussed.

Dr. Holmes Finch is the George and Frances Ball Distinguished Professor of Educational Psychology at BSU, and a professor of statistics and psychometrics. His research interests include structural equation modeling, item response theory, educational and psychological measurement, multilevel modeling, machine learning, and robust multivariate inference. In addition to conducting research in the field of statistics, he also regularly collaborates with colleagues in fields such as educational psychology, neuropsychology, and exercise physiology.