Dr. Chen has published more than 40 manuscripts in peer-reviewed journals on topics including behavioral and social science research, economic of obesity, health economics, health disparity, social epidemiology, and small area analysis, in leading field journals including Social Science & Medicine, American Journal of Public Health, Health Services Research, and many others. Dr. Chen received the 2013 CDC Excellence in Behavioral and Social Science Research Award.
His research areas include economics of obesity, health disparities, economics of genomics, social determinants of health, evaluation of food and nutrition programs, health econometrics, and economic evaluation.