The Samuel DuBois Cook Center is a scholarly collaborative that studies the causes and consequences of inequality and develops remedies for these disparities and their adverse effects.
Faculty Affiliate Dr. Fenaba R. Addo, Associate Professor of Public Policy at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, was quoted in two stories—for Duke News and for The Charlotte Post—for her recent research on the persistent and growing racial wealth gap in the United States. Addo’s paper—“Setting the Record Straight on Racial Wealth Inequality” was…
Research Affiliate Dr. Eric Griffith published a paper on the relation between religion/spirituality and the rates of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD) among Black people in the United States, finding that those who never attended religious services had significantly higher odds of being diagnosed with ADRD than those who attended services more than once…
Cook Center research was featured in Inequality.org Op-Ed on the Racial Wealth Gap. Senior Associate in Research and Communications Strategist Amber Holland takes readers through the work of Cook Center researchers to address questions about the Racial Wealth Gap and debunk common myths in their new study “Setting the Record Straight on Racial Wealth Inequality”….
Founding Director William Darity Jr. co-authored a new literature review in The BMJ that directly addresses one of the most persistent critiques of reparations: the claim that no feasible plan exists. The proposal outlines direct monetary payments as the clearest economic measure of the cumulative and intergenerational effects of white supremacy. The article argues that…
Cook Center Director William A. Darity Jr. will be among the featured speakers at an upcoming public hearing hosted by the New York State Community Commission on Reparations Remedies (NYSCCRR) on Saturday, March 21st, 2026, in Staten Island, New York. The hearing, titled “Economic Development: Quantifying Harms,” is part of the Commission’s statewide effort to…
New research co-authored by Faculty Affiliate Sarah Gaither, Associate Professor of Psychology & Neuroscience at Duke University, explores how something as routine as demographic forms can influence feelings of inclusion and identity among marginalized communities. Published in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, the study—“Enumeration or Exclusion? Demographic Forms and Latine Identity”—investigates how demographic questions may…
