Asst. Prof. Gülçin Con Wright

Gülçin Con Wright received her Bachelor's degree in Sociology at Boğaziçi University in 2007. During the Fall semester in 2006, she studied abroad at Emory University where she developed an academic interest in sociology of aging. She pursued this interest further in the Master's program at Middle East Technical University Sociology department where she also worked as a research assistant. She wrote a Master's thesis entitled "Negotiation of Parent Care among Siblings" as an advisee of Dr. Sibel Kalaycıoğlu.

After being awarded a Fulbright Scholarship and completing her Master’s degree in 2013, she moved to Indiana, U.S.A., to pursue a Dual-Title PhD. in Sociology and Gerontology with a Graduate Concentration on Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Purdue University. She worked as a Fulbright Fellow and research assistant at Within-Family Differences Study lab under the supervision of her advisor, Dr. J. Jill Suitor. She was also affiliated with the Center on Aging and the Life Course at Purdue. In collaboration with her research team members, she published several book and encyclopedia chapters as well as peer-reviewed articles in journals such as Journal of Marriage and Family, The Gerontologist, The Journals of Gerontology Series B: Psychological and Social Sciences, and Research on Aging. She received a research grant from Purdue Graduate School to conduct her dissertation study on older married couples’ initiation and negotiation of parental support to their adult children in later life.

Upon successfully defending her dissertation and completing her PhD. in 2018, Gülçin moved back to Turkey and started teaching at Middle East Technical University, TED University, and Bilkent University as a part-time lecturer. In January 2020, she joined the Sociology department at TED University as an Assistant Professor. Her teaching and research interests include family sociology, sociology of aging, medical sociology, sociology of the body from an intersectional perspective. She continues to conduct research on gender dynamics in intergenerational relationships and caregiving in later life in Turkish as well as American families. She is currently involved in two projects: 1) The first project examines under which circumstances and how grandmothers get involved in providing help to their adult children with childcare. This project is funded by SU Gender. 2) The second is a collaborative project with Dr. Jared M. Wright on the examination of intergenerational family ties in social media.