Judith (Judy) Perrigo is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Social Welfare at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs and serves as the Research Director for the Data Informed Futures (DIF) project at the UCLA Center for Healthier Children, Families, and Communities. Drawing on her clinical background supporting children and families in Los Angeles County, her scholarship and teaching center on prevention and early intervention (PEI) strategies to address structural inequities, particularly those affecting early childhood.

Dr. Perrigo’s research advances holistic wellbeing for children from birth to age five, with a focus on economic security, early learning environments, and health disparities. Her work aims to identify both protective and risk factors that shape developmental trajectories, applying an equity-centered PEI framework and leveraging qualitative, quantitative, and mixed-methods approaches tailored to each study’s goals.

Her current projects include studies using the Early Development Instrument (EDI) to track population-level trends in developmental health among kindergarteners, as well as multi-year randomized controlled trials examining the impact of unconditional cash transfers on early childhood outcomes. A key aspect of her work is ensuring that research findings are strengths-based, culturally responsive, and accessible to diverse audiences. Support for her work comes from the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, Society for Research in Child Development, First 5 Orange County, the Council on Social Work Education, and Los Angeles County.

Selected publications:

Perrigo, J. L., Morales, J., Jackson, N., Janus, M., Stanley, L., Wong, M., & Halfon, N. (2025). COVID-19 pandemic and the developmental health of kindergarteners. JAMA Pediatrics, 179(5), 550-558.

Perrigo, J. L., Molina, A. P., López, O., Traube, D., & Palinkas, L. A. (2024). The deinstitutionalization of children and adolescents in El Salvador’s child protection system. Child Abuse & Neglect, 147, 106601.

Aguilar, E., Perrigo, J. L., Pereira, N., Russ, S. A., Bader, J. L., & Halfon, N. (2024). Unveiling early childhood health inequities by age five through the National Neighborhood Equity Index and the Early Development Instrument. SSM-Population Health, 25, 101553.

Perrigo, J. L., Stanley, L., Mixson, L. S., Espinosa, L., Morales, J., Beck, C., & Halfon, N. (2024). Examining holistic developmental strengths and needs of multilingual kindergartners using the Early Development Instrument. International Journal of Educational Research Open, 6, 100315.

Perrigo, J. L., Block, E. P., Aguilar, E., Beck, C., & Halfon, N. (2023). Income is not an equalizer: Health development inequities by ethnoracial backgrounds in California kindergartners. BMC Public Health, 23(1), 2474.

Perrigo, J. L., Samek, A., & Hurlburt, M. (2022). Minority and low-SES families’ experiences during the early phases of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis: A qualitative study. Children and Youth Services Review, 140, 106594.