Research Fellow (PhD or Postdoctoral) - LMIC Family Planning

Surgo Health is building the Behavioral Intelligence layer for healthcare — revealing why people behave as they do, predicting what they will do next, and helping organizations make the decisions that change outcomes.

A Public Benefit Corporation grounded in two decades of global health experience, Surgo generates foundational behavioral data that reveals the unseen why and builds the AI products that powers decision-grade insights at population scale — equipping healthcare organizations, funders, and public agencies to act on what actually shapes health outcomes: people's beliefs, motivations, and barriers.

From predicting who will enroll and remain in a clinical trial, to understanding what drives treatment decisions, to designing more effective health programs, Surgo brings the missing human layer into decisions traditionally made with clinical data alone.

Backed by 40+ peer-reviewed publications and trusted by partners including the Gates Foundation, J&J, Takeda, Pivotal Ventures, and the Clinton Health Access Initiative, Surgo is building a future where healthcare organizations don't just understand human behavior, but anticipate it — making healthcare more personal, precise, and effective for everyone.

Role Summary

We are inviting applications for a Research Fellow to join Surgo Health’s Gates Foundation (GF)-funded Family Planning initiative, a multi-country study spanning Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire, Nigeria (Kano, Kaduna, and Lagos states), and Pakistan (Sindh).

This fellowship is centered on manuscript production. Fellows will collaborate closely with Surgo's research team to advance a priority research question – building on analysis and framing already underway – through to a submission-ready manuscript for a peer-reviewed journal.

What you’ll achieve:

What You’ll Achieve

• Develop and lead a manuscript around an agreed priority research question, building on existing analyses and data and conducting additional analyses as needed
• Produce a submission-ready, publication-quality manuscript for a peer-reviewed journal
• Translate complex survey and causal-modeling findings into insights relevant to global health policy and program design
• Contribute to Surgo Health’s growing portfolio of family planning research and thought leadership in low- and middle-income country (LMIC) contexts

Research Focus Areas

Priority Papers

You will lead on completing the analysis that has already been started. With this, you will write the manuscript, with guidance and support from the research leads throughout.

1. Couples-linked segmentation in Northern Nigeria (Kano and Kaduna): How do women's and their partners' own attitudes toward family planning align or diverge, and what does this mean for programs designed to shift partner-related norms? This work links directly to an active program partnership focused on norm-shifting interventions in the region.
2. Rethinking how we measure FP intention (Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire, Pakistan/Sindh): Standard measures of contraceptive intention – a binary yes/no, or a 12-month time horizon – may obscure meaningful variation in fertility desire, intent strength, near-term planning, and confidence. This paper aims to describe how we have developed and tested a more multidimensional approach to measuring intent across three countries.
3. Patterns of change in FP attitudes and behaviors over time in FP journeys (Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire, Nigeria [Kano and Kaduna], Pakistan [Sindh]): Using panel data collected roughly a year to two after baseline, this paper aims to characterize which women's contraceptive trajectories are "sticky", and tests which baseline predictors of conversion, intent development, and discontinuation generalize across countries versus which are context-specific.

Additional Areas of Interest

If none of the priority papers above are the right fit, the following list is intended to spark ideas rather than define the boundaries. If you have an interesting idea that isn't included here, please feel free to propose it.

• Determinants of contraceptive intention, uptake, and method choice in Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire, Nigeria (Kano, Kaduna, Lagos), and Pakistan (Sindh)
• Causal inference approaches to family planning behavior (e.g., Bayesian networks, causal forests, propensity score matching, doubly robust/DoubleML methods, G-computation)
• Segmentation-informed analysis using belief- and behavior-based segments to explain heterogeneous contraceptive outcomes
• Comparative, cross-country analysis of family planning drivers and structural barriers
• Subgroup and geographic vulnerability (e.g., state-level variation, rural/urban differences, adolescent and youth subpopulations)
• Contraceptive discontinuation and continuation dynamics
• Comparative methodology, including analysis that contextualizes findings alongside established survey instruments (e.g., DHS, PMA)

Data Available to Fellows

Fellows will work with de-identified data from Surgo's Gates Foundation-funded multi-country Family Planning study: a cross-sectional baseline survey plus a longitudinal follow-up conducted at a later point in time, across Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire, Nigeria, and Pakistan (Sindh).

Baseline: Women's FP Survey — Representative baseline surveys of women of reproductive age (15–49), covering fertility intentions, contraceptive use and method choice, household decision-making, perceptions and norms, health system access, and information exposure. Data was collected in 2024 to early 2025 depending on the geography. Sample sizes range from roughly 7,000 women in Senegal to around 10,000 in Côte d'Ivoire and Pakistan (Sindh), with Nigeria in between. In Nigeria, the baseline covers three states — Lagos, Kano, and Kaduna.

Baseline subset: Male Partner Interviews — In a smaller subset of baseline households, the woman's male partner also completed a companion interview, capturing his perspective on decision-making, approval, and household dynamics — enabling dyadic/couple-level analysis. Partner interviews were conducted with roughly one in ten baseline households in most countries, somewhat higher in Nigeria.

Follow-up: Longitudinal Women's Survey — A subset of baseline women who consented to re-contact were re-interviewed roughly one to two years after baseline to track changes in intentions, behavior, and access over time. This enables analysis of intention-to-behavior gaps, method continuation/discontinuation, and segment transitions. Follow-up samples range from under 2,000 women in Senegal to several thousand in Côte d'Ivoire, Nigeria (Kano and Kaduna), and Pakistan (Sindh), split between women who were contraceptive users and non-users at baseline.

Fellows will receive final sample sizes, codebooks, and documentation upon onboarding.

What You’ll Do

• Develop and lead a research paper within agreed priority areas, either building on existing analyses and insights from the GF-funded multi-country family planning studies or developing a new research question using the available data, with additional analyses as needed.
• Synthesize and translate existing findings and/or generate new analyses to deepen understanding of the mechanisms, risk factors, and protective factors shaping family planning behaviors and outcomes.
• If applicable, utilize rigorous quantitative and/or causal inference methods appropriate to the research question
• Draft and revise a manuscript for submission to a peer-reviewed journal, incorporating feedback from Surgo’s research team
• Collaborate with Surgo’s research scientists for methodological guidance and framing

Expected Outputs

• One submission-ready manuscript for a peer-reviewed journal (primary deliverable)
• Clean, documented analysis code and supporting analytic materials if appropriate

Program Structure & Support

Selected Fellows will receive:

• Access to de-identified, multi-country family planning survey data under a data use agreement
• Codebooks and methodological documentation
• Regular check-ins with Surgo’s research team for methodological guidance and feedback on drafts
• Methodological and analytic support
• Guidance on funder framing and positioning
• Co-authorship and publication support
• Opportunity to present progress to the broader research team

Fellows will retain academic independence while benefiting from Surgo’s translational and methodological support.

Fellows are additionally supported through a structured cadence of meetings throughout the fellowship. Regular check-ins are designed to keep work on track and give fellows direct access to Surgo researchers and leadership:

Weekly check-ins with Surgo project lead(s): Fellows will meet twice per week with their respective Surgo project lead(s). These sessions are intended to support analytic progress, troubleshoot methodological questions, and provide feedback on developing outputs. Fellows are invited to join the Surgo FP analytics team meetings. This gives fellows visibility into the broader team context and an opportunity to share work in progress with colleagues across the initiative.

Leadership exposure (optional): Fellows will have two scheduled opportunities to present findings to Hannah Kemp, Chief Strategy Officer, Client Engagement and Mokshada Jain, Vice President of Global Health. These sessions are built into the fellowship calendar and are a chance to share developing work with senior leadership. Fellows who want additional exposure can also request up to two optional meetings with Vincent Huang, Senior Director of Data Science & AI, to discuss their analytic approach and findings. These sessions are available but entirely at the fellow's discretion.

Timeline

• Project Duration: maximum 17 weeks (~4 months)
• Earliest start date: Oct 15, 2026

Expected main deliverables include:

• (Week 1-2): Confirmed scope of work (Week 1–2): For papers requiring new analysis, this is an analytic plan. For papers building primarily on existing analysis or an established framing (e.g., the intent measurement paper), this is instead a confirmed research question, agreed division of remaining work between the Fellow and lead(s), and a manuscript outline.
• (Week 6 or earlier): Preliminary results or draft findings (midpoint review)
• (Week 12 or earlier): Draft initial manuscript for internal reviews delivered
• (Week 16-17 or earlier): Final submission-ready manuscript delivered

Authorship

Fellows are credited as co-first-author or first author depending on their contribution. All publications and external communications will follow the agreed authorship and review process. Surgo Health retains the right to review and approve all outputs prior to external submission or distribution.

Stipend

Stipend amount: $6000

Payment is milestone-based. The stipend is distributed in four equal installments, with 25% ($1,500) awarded upon the successful completion of each milestone.

Milestone | Conditions for payment

Milestone 1
| Scope of work confirmed (week 1-2): For papers requiring new analysis, this is an analytic plan. For papers building primarily on existing analysis or an established framing, this is instead a confirmed research question, agreed division of remaining work between the Fellow and lead(s), and a manuscript outline.Signed data use agreement on fileSatisfactory onboarding requirements (cybersecurity training, etc)

Milestone 2 | Preliminary results or draft findings shared at midpoint review meetingSurgo team confirms satisfactory progress

Milestone 3 | First draft manuscript

Milestone 4 | Two rounds of internal review revisions incorporated

Submission-ready manuscript delivered and accepted by Surgo team.

All deliverables complete by agreed deadline

About you:

About You

• PhD candidate, postdoctoral researcher, or early-career researcher in a relevant field (e.g., public health, demography, economics, biostatistics, epidemiology, data science)
• Strong experience in quantitative analysis, survey data, and/or causal inference methods
• Demonstrated ability to produce rigorous, publication-quality research
• Experienced in family planning, reproductive health in LMIC contexts is strongly preferred
• Experience in behavioral science and program implementation context is a plus
• Comfort working with large-scale, multi-country survey datasets

Location: Remote friendly

Travel: None required

How to Apply

Path A — Join a Priority Paper. Apply to collaborate on one of the three papers listed under Priority Papers Open for Collaboration. In place of a general statement of interest, submit a short written response (up to 1,000 words) addressing all three of the following:

1. Understanding: In your own words, what is the core analytic challenge this paper is trying to solve, and why does it matter? (2–3 sentences)
2. Approach: How would you approach the methodological question below for your chosen paper? Walk through your reasoning, including tradeoffs you'd weigh.

• Couples-linked segmentation in Northern Nigeria: How would you approach measuring alignment or divergence in paired partner responses on family planning attitudes? What would guide your definition of "alignment," and how would you handle the non-independence between partners' responses?
• Rethinking how we measure FP intention: How would you validate that a multidimensional measure of contraceptive intention (fertility desire, intent strength, near-term planning, confidence) actually captures distinct dimensions, rather than one underlying construct measured multiple ways?
• Longitudinal typologies of FP journeys: How would you define and empirically identify "sticky" versus "fluid" contraceptive trajectories from panel data, and how would you convince yourself the resulting typology reflects real behavioral patterns rather than measurement noise?

1. Framing & Evidence Needed: Based on what's described above, what angle or framing would you propose for this manuscript? What evidence or additional analysis would need to emerge from the data to support that framing — and what would change your mind if it didn't?

Path B — Propose Your Own Idea. Apply with your own research question, grounded in the Additional Areas of Interest listed above (or a closely related idea). Include a short concept note (up to 1,000 words) outlining your proposed question, analytic approach, and how it would draw on the available data.

All applicants should submit:

• CV or resume
• Path A: the written response described above (up to 1,000 words), indicating which priority paper you're applying to. This can be a Word document or PDF file attached to your application
• Path B: the concept note described above (up to 1,000 words). This can be a Word document or PDF file attached to your application
• One prior peer-reviewed publication (strongly preferred), as first author or a major contributing author. If that is unavailable, submit a scientific writing sample. This can be a Word document or PDF file attached to your application
• Contact information for two references

Benefits

What You’ll Love About Surgo

• Fantastic, fun and collaborative colleagues; opportunity to solve tough challenges in healthcare and global health
• Ability to be entrepreneurial, with tremendous opportunities for growth
• Public Benefit Corporation with an impact and equity mission

Our Hiring Philosophy

We hire for passion and core competencies.

We look for problem solvers and lateral thinkers.

We love it if you have done different things with your time.

If you think you are ideal for this position, write to us even if your experience doesn’t match all the requirements listed above.

Equal Opportunity and Diversity Policy

Surgo believes a diverse, inclusive staff makes a stronger team and more impactful organization, and we are committed to building and developing this team and environment. Qualified people of all races, ethnicities, cultures, ages, sex, genders, sexual orientation, gender identities and expressions, languages, social class, marital status, religions, veteran status, and disabilities are strongly encouraged to apply.