Danya Keene
Biographic Data
| ID | 148920 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Danya Keene |
| GIVEN NAMES | Danya |
| FAMILY NAME | Keene |
| SIGNATURE | KEENE D |
| AFFILIATIONS | Yale University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-7612-8292 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 69 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 794 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 69 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2006 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 13 |
“This is an exposure of all the things that were previously wrong”: Renters’ experiences with Emergency Rental Assistance
Housing insecurity is a pervasive problem for American renters. This precarity is rooted in a system that privileges ownership rights over occupancy rights, causing an imbalance of power between landlords and renters. While the insecurity of renting in urban America has been a focus of investigation for over a century, the economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic reignited public interest in this issue and centered important questions regarding …
“It’s a Process—But It Shouldn’t Take This Long”: The Psychological Burden of Waiting for Rental Assistance
A growing and severe shortage of affordable housing in the U.S. has led to an increase in cost-burdened households and housing insecurity nationwide. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) provides rental assistance through programs such as Housing Choice Vouchers and public or project-based housing to increase access to affordable housing. However, available funding for these programs limits their supply, creating extensive w…
Rental assistance impacts on diabetes: Insights from a longitudinal mixed-methods analysis
The U.S. faces a persistent shortage of affordable housing, forcing many low-income individuals with chronic illnesses such as diabetes to navigate trade-offs between housing, healthcare, and basic needs essential for disease management. Rental assistance may alleviate these pressures by increasing housing stability, reducing financial strain, and enabling safer medication storage and food preparation. However, only a fraction of eligible househo…
‘ If I wouldn’t have had them, I would’ve been lost ’: Tenant Right to Counsel in Cleveland
As eviction filings begin to surpass pre-pandemic levels and the consequences of eviction for health, well-being, and stability become increasingly recognized, legal assistance has emerged as a growing strategy to prevent evictions and their well-documented negative sequelae. Between July 2017 and December 2025, 27 U.S. jurisdictions passed right to counsel (RTC) legislation, formally establishing a right to legal counsel for tenants in eviction …
Associations between greenness change and mental distress prevalence change by housing tenure: An analysis of 109 U.S. metropolitan areas
A Descriptive Analysis of Tenant Right to Counsel Law and Praxis 2017–2024
This article provides the first comprehensive description of state and local tenant right to counsel (RTC) policies. From July 2017 through June 2024, five states, 17 cities, and one county passed legislation to formally create a right to legal counsel for tenants in eviction proceedings. These policies contain heterogeneous provisions, including their intended purposes, design and administration requirements, eligibility criteria, and when in th…
Do Rental Assistance Programs Relieve Overcrowding for Children
Emergency rental assistance under Covid capitalism: A case study assessment of state and local rent relief programs
Race, wealth and health: The role of reparations
Tenant right to counsel and health: Pathways and possibilities
Since 2017, more than a dozen municipalities and five states have passed Right to Counsel (RTC) legislation that guarantees access to free full-scope legal representation for eligible tenants facing eviction. Given the novelty of RTC, much remains unknown about the impacts of these programs or policies on individual renters and their communities. Among these unknown impacts is the way that RTC may affect individual tenant health and population he…
“Being homeless can burn you out”: A qualitative study of individuals’ experience of administrative burden when accessing homeless services
Despite significant efforts to address the homelessness in the United States, on any given night more than 500,000 individuals lack shelter/place to call home. This persistent and high rate of homelessness can be attributed to the shortage of affordable housing options, the eviction crisis, and unmet need for rental assistance. Administrative burdens tied to homeless services may also create barriers to housing for individuals experiencing homele…
Eviction from rental housing and its links to health: A scoping review
Eviction from rental housing is common throughout the United States and globally. • We synthesize the methods and key findings of recent research on eviction and health. • Most studies found significant links between eviction exposures and poor health. • Some studies found that eviction's impacts were most severe for marginalized groups. • Growing evidence suggests that eviction prevention policies positively impact health
Eviction as a community health exposure
Evidence suggests that being evicted harms health. Largely ignored in the existing literature is the possibility that evictions exert community-level health effects, affecting evicted individuals' social networks and shaping broader community conditions. In this narrative review, we summarize evidence and lay out a theoretical model for eviction as a community health exposure, mediated through four paths: 1) shifting ecologies of infectious disea…
Covid-19 Housing Policy: State and Federal Eviction Moratoria and Supportive Measures in the United States During the Pandemic
This article provides the first comprehensive description of federal and state housing policy response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Beginning on March 13, 2020, the federal government, 43 states, the District of Columbia, and five American territories issued eviction moratoria that varied in terms of justification, the stage(s) of eviction frozen, the duration and source of protections, and the eligible population. There were cross-state differences…
A conceptual understanding of the impact of interconnected forms of racism on maternal hypertension through Black Women’s lived experiences
Significant racial disparities in maternal mortality and morbidity rates in the U.S. have persisted over time, with Black women disproportionately bearing the burden. Studies have documented how experiences of structural racism contributes the disparities we see. However, most of these studies have focused on how domains of racism operate simultaneously, yet little is known about how these domains are interconnected and adversely impact health du…
Trusted residents and housing assistance to decrease violence exposure in New Haven (TRUE Haven): A strengths-based and community-driven stepped-wedge intervention to reduce gun violence
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT05723614. Registration date: February 01, 2023. Please refer to https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT05723614 for public and scientific inquiries
The Affordable Rental Housing Crisis and Population Health Equity: A Multidimensional and Multilevel Framework
Structural Racism, the Social Determination of Health, and Health Inequities: The Intersecting Impacts of Housing and Mass Incarceration
Public health researchers have directed increasing attention to structural racism and its implications for health equity. The conceptualization of racism as historically rooted in systems, structures, and institutions of US society has important implications for addressing social determinants of health (SDOH). It requires theorizing SDOH as embedded in and expressions of racially oppressive historical structures that are manifested in and maintai…
A Little Bit of a Security Blanket”: Renter Experiences with Covid-19–Era Eviction Moratoriums
Policy makers at the federal, state, and local levels responded to the COVID-19 pandemic with a broad array of policies that were intended to prevent housing instability among renters. Eviction moratoriums were an important part of this policy landscape. Recent evidence indicates that these moratoriums were effective in reducing eviction-filing rates, but many questions remain about the impacts of these policies. Drawing on qualitative interviews…
Rethinking the effects of gentrification on the health of Black communities in the United States: Towards a racialized health framework
Current research suggests that gentrification is an important determinant of health. Furthermore, this research concludes that the health impacts of gentrification are heterogeneous and may have adverse impacts on Black Americans. However, existing gentrification and health research has not fully engaged with the racialized processes that produce these uneven impacts. To address this gap, we develop a conceptual framework to describe how gentrifi…
The Squeaky Wheel Gets the Grease: Rental Assistance Applicants' Quests for a Rationed and Scarce Resource
In 2016, only one in five eligible U.S. households received rental assistance and waiting lists averaged two years nationally. The gap between available rental assistance and need requires systems to allocate this scarce resource. The way potential rental assistance recipients experience and navigate these systems is likely to shape who ultimately receives assistance. We draw on repeated qualitative interviews (N=238) with low-income New Haven re…
“You Have a Place to Rest Your Head in Peace”: Use of Hotels for Adults Experiencing Homelessness During the Covid-19 Pandemic
Hotel housing was an intervention implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic to reduce the spread of the virus among people experiencing homelessness. Individuals living in congregate shelter or unsheltered settings in New Haven, Connecticut, were relocated into two hotels at the start of the pandemic. In this paper we characterize and explore the experiences of 18 individuals who were moved to hotels. Participants shared that the hotels, as oppose…
The Effects of Rental Assistance on Housing Stability, Quality, Autonomy, and Affordability
Federal rental assistance is an important source of affordable housing for low income households, given a growing and severe affordable housing crisis. However, few studies have examined the extent to which rental assistance may improve housing access. This paper examines associations between rental assistance receipt and four dimensions of housing: quality, stability, autonomy and affordability. We draw on data from a longitudinal cohort study o…
Navigating fear, shyness, and discomfort during menstruation in Cambodia
While increased attention has been given to girls’ menstrual hygiene management (MHM) experiences in schools as they relate to managerial challenges, research exploring girls’ psychosocial experiences during menstruation and their needs in non-school environments remains limited. This study investigates the knowledge, attitudes, and practices regarding menstruation and MHM (M&MHM) among rural Cambodian girls (at least 14 years old, post-menarche;…
Police shootings, now that seems to be the main issue” – Black pregnant women’s anticipation of police brutality towards their children
Interactions between Black people and police on a personal, familial, community, and societal level influenced how Black pregnant women understand the potential for police brutality towards their children. Anticipated police brutality is a source of stress during pregnancy, which may adversely influence maternal and infant health outcomes. Police brutality must be addressed in all communities to prevent harming the health of birthing people and t…
Weathering” and Age Patterns of Allostatic Load Scores Among Blacks and Whites in the United States
Objectives. We considered whether US Blacks experience early health deterioration, as measured across biological indicators of repeated exposure and adaptation to stressors. Methods. Using National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey data, we examined allostatic load scores for adults aged 18–64 years. We estimated probability of a high score by age, race, gender, and poverty status and Blacks’ odds of having a high score relative to Whites’ …
Race, class and the stigma of place: Moving to “opportunity” in Eastern Iowa
Eviction, Health Inequity, and the Spread of Covid-19: Housing Policy as a Primary Pandemic Mitigation Strategy
Black Pregnant Women “Get the Most Judgment: A Qualitative Study of the Experiences of Black Women at the Intersection of Race, Gender, and Pregnancy
Mass incarceration, race inequality, and health: Expanding concepts and assessing impacts on well-being
Stress, Allostatic Load, and Health of Mexican Immigrants
Objective. To assess whether the cumulative impact of exposure to repeated or chronic stressors, as measured by allostatic load, contributes to the “unhealthy assimilation” effects often observed for immigrants with time in the United States. Methods. We analyzed data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 1988–1994, to estimate multivariate logistic regression models of the odds of having a high allostatic load score among Me…
Everyone called me grandma”: Public housing demolition and relocation among older adults in Atlanta
Sex, status, competition, and exclusion: Intraminority stress from within the gay community and gay and bisexual men’s mental health
252). Overall, these experiments provide partial support for the possibility that gay and bisexual men's status concerns underlie their experience of gay community stress. Together, these studies advance psychological and sociological accounts of gay and bisexual men's mental health beyond minority stress theory, with implications for intervention. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved)
Stigma, housing and identity after prison
Existing research suggests that individuals who are released from prison face considerable challenges in obtaining access to safe, stable, and affordable places to live and call home. This article draws on repeated qualitative interviews (conducted every 6 months over a period of 3 years) with 44 formerly incarcerated individuals, to understand how these individuals experience the search for a home after their prison release. The interviews show …
Fragile health and fragile wealth: Mortgage strain among African American homeowners
I don't know what home feels like anymore: Residential spaces and the absence of ontological security for people returning from incarceration
Community-Based Support among African American Public Housing Residents
Length of residence and social integration: The contingent effects of neighborhood poverty
That wasn't really a place to worry about diabetes: Housing access and diabetes self-management among low-income adults
Getting sick and falling behind: Health and the risk of mortgage default and home foreclosure
BACKGROUND: An emerging literature shows that mortgage strain can lead to poor health outcomes, but less work has focused on whether and how health shocks influence mortgage distress. We examine the link between changes in health status and default/foreclosure risk among older middle-aged adults. METHOD: We used National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1979 data and multivariate logistic regression models to examine the relationship between changes i…
Does rental assistance improve mental health? Insights from a longitudinal cohort study
Eviction as a community health exposure
Evidence suggests that being evicted harms health. Largely ignored in the existing literature is the possibility that evictions exert community-level health effects, affecting evicted individuals' social networks and shaping broader community conditions. In this narrative review, we summarize evidence and lay out a theoretical model for eviction as a community health exposure, mediated through four paths: 1) shifting ecologies of infectious disea…
When You’re in a Crisis Like That, You Don’t Want People to Know”: Mortgage Strain, Stigma, and Mental Health
Objectives. We analyzed experiences of stigmatization, concealment, and isolation among African American homeowners who were experiencing mortgage strain. Methods. We conducted semistructured interviews between March 2012 and May 2013 with 28 African American homeowners in a northeastern US city who were experiencing mortgage strain. We coded all of the transcripts and reviewed data for codes relating to stigma, sharing information, social suppor…
Cultural Reflexivity in Health Research and Practice
Recent public health movements have invoked cultural change to improve health and reduce health disparities. We argue that these cultural discourses have sometimes justified and maintained health inequalities when those with power and authority designated their own social practices as legitimate and healthy while labeling the practices of marginalized groups as illegitimate or unhealthy. This “misrecognition,” which creates seemingly objective kn…
Quantifying the Restrictiveness of Local Housing Authority Policies Toward People With Criminal Justice Histories: United States, 2009–2018
Objectives. To quantify variation in the restrictiveness of local public housing authority policies related to the admission and eviction of people with criminal justice histories. Methods. We conducted content analysis of housing authority policy documents for US cities with a population of 100 000 or more (n = 152). Factor analysis identified policy provisions to create a restrictiveness score (range = 0–8). We explored associations between res…
The Effects of Length of Residence and Exposure to Violence on Perceptions of Neighborhood Safety in an Urban Sample
Structural Racism, the Social Determination of Health, and Health Inequities: The Intersecting Impacts of Housing and Mass Incarceration
Public health researchers have directed increasing attention to structural racism and its implications for health equity. The conceptualization of racism as historically rooted in systems, structures, and institutions of US society has important implications for addressing social determinants of health (SDOH). It requires theorizing SDOH as embedded in and expressions of racially oppressive historical structures that are manifested in and maintai…
The Squeaky Wheel Gets the Grease: Rental Assistance Applicants' Quests for a Rationed and Scarce Resource
In 2016, only one in five eligible U.S. households received rental assistance and waiting lists averaged two years nationally. The gap between available rental assistance and need requires systems to allocate this scarce resource. The way potential rental assistance recipients experience and navigate these systems is likely to shape who ultimately receives assistance. We draw on repeated qualitative interviews (N=238) with low-income New Haven re…
A Little Bit of a Security Blanket”: Renter Experiences with Covid-19–Era Eviction Moratoriums
Policy makers at the federal, state, and local levels responded to the COVID-19 pandemic with a broad array of policies that were intended to prevent housing instability among renters. Eviction moratoriums were an important part of this policy landscape. Recent evidence indicates that these moratoriums were effective in reducing eviction-filing rates, but many questions remain about the impacts of these policies. Drawing on qualitative interviews…
Filling the Gaps in an Inadequate Housing Safety Net: The Experiences of Informal Housing Providers and Implications for Their Housing Security, Health, and Well-Being
The authors examine the experiences of informal housing providers, defined as those who provide housing and shelter to family, friends, and acquaintances in the context of a severe affordable rental housing crisis. Forty-five semistructured interviews were conducted with informal housing providers in and around New Haven, Connecticut, in 2021. The data describe the critical role informal housing providers play in addressing gaps in the housing sa…
Weathering” and Age Patterns of Allostatic Load Scores Among Blacks and Whites in the United States
Objectives. We considered whether US Blacks experience early health deterioration, as measured across biological indicators of repeated exposure and adaptation to stressors. Methods. Using National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey data, we examined allostatic load scores for adults aged 18–64 years. We estimated probability of a high score by age, race, gender, and poverty status and Blacks’ odds of having a high score relative to Whites’ …
Geronimus Et Al. Respond
Between 1980 and 2009, the US incarcerated population exploded from 300 000 to more than 2 million. This unprecedented increase, set in motion by the 1980s War on Drugs and exacerbated during the 1990s by Get Tough on Crime policies, resulted in more than 7 million individuals being incarcerated or placed on probation or on parole by 2004. Because of race- and place-selective stops, searches, arrests, prosecutions, and sentencing, 90% of felons c…
Stress, Allostatic Load, and Health of Mexican Immigrants
Objective. To assess whether the cumulative impact of exposure to repeated or chronic stressors, as measured by allostatic load, contributes to the “unhealthy assimilation” effects often observed for immigrants with time in the United States. Methods. We analyzed data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 1988–1994, to estimate multivariate logistic regression models of the odds of having a high allostatic load score among Me…
Leaving Chicago for Iowa's "Fields of Opportunity": Community Dispossession, Rootlessness, and the Quest for Somewhere to "Be OK"
In recent years, urban development and public housing demolition have posed challenges to the social and geographic rootedness of low-income African Americans in urban areas. In particular, in Chicago, widespread public housing demolition, occurring in the context of rapid gentrification, has contributed to increasing shortages of affordable low-income housing. This study uses in-depth interviews and participant observation to examine the migrati…
Race, class and the stigma of place: Moving to “opportunity” in Eastern Iowa
Weathering” Hope VI: The Importance of Evaluating the Population Health Impact of Public Housing Demolition and Displacement
HOPE VI has funded the demolition of public housing developments across the United States and created in their place mixed-income communities that are often inaccessible to the majority of former tenants. This recent uprooting of low-income, urban, and predominantly African American communities raises concern about the health impacts of the HOPE VI program for a population that already shoulders an enormous burden of excess morbidity and mortalit…
Community-Based Support among African American Public Housing Residents
Length of residence and social integration: The contingent effects of neighborhood poverty
Everyone called me grandma”: Public housing demolition and relocation among older adults in Atlanta
Spatial stigma and health inequality
A large body of literature has considered the way that places contribute to the health of their residents. The bulk of this research has considered the numerous risks and resources that are contained within the bounded spaces of neighborhoods and communities. Only recently have scholars begun to consider how these material and social conditions interact with the symbolic dimensions of place to further affect health. In this conceptual paper, we d…
Fragile health and fragile wealth: Mortgage strain among African American homeowners
Reactivity to a Spouse’s Interpersonal Suffering in Late Life Marriage: A Mixed-Methods Approach
Spouses' interpersonal suffering may negatively affect both men and women's cardiovascular health, and older husbands may be particularly affected
Getting sick and falling behind: Health and the risk of mortgage default and home foreclosure
BACKGROUND: An emerging literature shows that mortgage strain can lead to poor health outcomes, but less work has focused on whether and how health shocks influence mortgage distress. We examine the link between changes in health status and default/foreclosure risk among older middle-aged adults. METHOD: We used National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1979 data and multivariate logistic regression models to examine the relationship between changes i…
Cultural Reflexivity in Health Research and Practice
Recent public health movements have invoked cultural change to improve health and reduce health disparities. We argue that these cultural discourses have sometimes justified and maintained health inequalities when those with power and authority designated their own social practices as legitimate and healthy while labeling the practices of marginalized groups as illegitimate or unhealthy. This “misrecognition,” which creates seemingly objective kn…
When You’re in a Crisis Like That, You Don’t Want People to Know”: Mortgage Strain, Stigma, and Mental Health
Objectives. We analyzed experiences of stigmatization, concealment, and isolation among African American homeowners who were experiencing mortgage strain. Methods. We conducted semistructured interviews between March 2012 and May 2013 with 28 African American homeowners in a northeastern US city who were experiencing mortgage strain. We coded all of the transcripts and reviewed data for codes relating to stigma, sharing information, social suppor…
Determinants of perceived insufficient milk among new mothers in León, Nicaragua
Breastfeeding has been shown to improve maternal and child health. In Nicaragua, the primary risk of death and disability-adjusted life years among children under 5 years of age is suboptimal breastfeeding. Although the Nicaraguan Ministry of Health promotes exclusive breastfeeding from within the first half hour through the first 6 months of life, less than a third of children in the country under 6 months of age are exclusively breastfed. As pa…
There's a Difference—I Own This”: Negotiating Social and Financial Services under Threat of Mortgage Foreclosure
Although national housing markets have recovered from the Great Recession, communities hardest hit by the foreclosure crisis remain immersed in mortgage trouble. Nineteen percent of homeowners are underwater on their mortgages and communities of color are overrepresented among zip codes still experiencing default in rising numbers. The social services needs of homeowners at risk of foreclosure show few signs of abating. High levels of market risk…
The big ole gay express’: Sexual minority stigma, mobility and health in the small city
Recent research has examined how gay and bisexual men experience and navigate the variations in sexual minority stigma that exist across geographic contexts, with implications for their health. We extend this literature on stigma, mobility, and health by considering the unique and understudied setting of the small city. Drawing on semi-structured interviews (n = 29) conducted in two small US cities (New Haven and Hartford), we find that these sma…
A qualitative analysis of multi-level barriers to HIV testing among women in Lebanon
While the number of HIV cases in the Middle East and North Africa region is low compared to other regions, recent studies show that incidence is increasing especially among high-risk populations; in particular, little is known about women and HIV in the region. Through semi-structured interviews with sexual healthcare providers and staff at non-governmental organisations, we sought to understand barriers to HIV testing among women in Lebanon. Usi…
Drug Treatment Accessed through the Criminal Justice System: Participants’ Perspectives and Uses
The Effects of Length of Residence and Exposure to Violence on Perceptions of Neighborhood Safety in an Urban Sample
Mass incarceration, race inequality, and health: Expanding concepts and assessing impacts on well-being
That wasn't really a place to worry about diabetes: Housing access and diabetes self-management among low-income adults
Stigma, housing and identity after prison
Existing research suggests that individuals who are released from prison face considerable challenges in obtaining access to safe, stable, and affordable places to live and call home. This article draws on repeated qualitative interviews (conducted every 6 months over a period of 3 years) with 44 formerly incarcerated individuals, to understand how these individuals experience the search for a home after their prison release. The interviews show …
Transfer is not a transition – voices of Jamaican adolescents with HIV and their health care providers
Increasing access to antiretroviral therapy in resource-limited settings (RLS) has resulted in the survival of perinatally HIV-infected children into adulthood. We characterized the transition process from pediatric to adult care by conducting semi-structured interviews of HIV-infected adolescents and health care providers in Jamaica. Using an inductive content analytic approach, four themes emerged: (1) Transition should be holistic and a proces…
Medicine (44 works) · Political science (39 works) · Homelessness and Social Issues (36 works) · Psychology (32 works) · Sociology (31 works) · Environmental health (21 works) · Health disparities and outcomes (20 works) · Business (19 works) · Economics (19 works) · Urban, Neighborhood, and Segregation Studies (19 works)