European Executive Research Agency (REA) Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Postdoctoral Fellowships is supporting our Management Engineering Faculty Member Assistant Professor Aysun HIZIROĞLU AYGÜN’s Project titled “YouCDF.” 

European Executive Research Agency (REA) Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Postdoctoral Fellowships, which aims to support researchers’ careers and foster excellence in research, awarded  171,500 Euros to our Management Engineering Faculty Member Assistant Professor Aysun HIZIROĞLU AYGÜN’s project titled “YouCDF- Young Children of Disadvantaged Families: A Comprehensive Analysis of Parental Human Capital Investment and Child Health.” The project focuses on the within-country differences in children’s access to essential health care and aims to provide a systematic and comprehensive analysis of the amount, types, and short- and long-term consequences of parental investment to children from the perspective of health economics. The project will be completed in two years. During the first year, Dr. Hızıroğlu Aygün is visiting the Business Advancement Center for Health (BACH) at the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management. Dr. Hızıroğlu Aygün works in close proximity to BACH’s founding director and Distinguished Mcknight University Professor, And C. Arthur Williams Jr. Professor In Healthcare Risk Management Prof. Pinar Karaca-Mandic during her time at the University of Minnesota. In the second year, Dr. Hızıroğlu Aygün will continue her research and dissemination activities at the Department of  Economics at ITÜ under the supervision of Economics Department Chair Prof. Bülent Güloğlu. 

Aysun Hızıroğlu Aygün says, “The research outcomes to be produced within the scope of the YouCDF aim to identify the health and developmental problems faced by children living in poverty. Gaps in health outcomes exist even in countries with Universal Health Coverage because part of the problem is related to the lifestyle and limited access to nutritious food. That is why understanding the families’ human capital investment decisions is essential.” 

About Assistant Professor Aysun Hızıroğlu Aygün

Dr. Aygün is an assistant professor in the Department of Economics at Istanbul Technical University (İTÜ). She teaches labor economics, the economics of education, and health economics. Her research focuses on the evaluation of policies through empirical microeconomic studies, concentrating on women, children, and refugees. 

Her research has been funded by The Scientific and Technological Research Institution of Turkey (TÜBİTAK) and the Economic Research Forum (ERF). She is a recipient of a career grant from TÜBİTAK, through which she will build a research agenda about underlying mechanisms of mental health in Turkey.