Biography of Dr. Dudley Poston

Dudley L. Poston, Jr. is Professor Emeritus of Sociology, and the George T. and Gladys H. Abell Professor of Liberal Arts, at Texas A&M University. Prior to his retirement, he also held the positions of Adjunct Professor of Demography at People’s University, Beijing, China; Adjunct Professor of Sociology at Fuzhou University, Fuzhou, China; and Adjunct Professor of Demography at Nanjing Normal University, Nanjing, China. He retired from Texas A&M University in June of 2019.

Dr. Poston joined the faculty of Texas A&M University in 1992, and served as the Head of the Department of Sociology from 1992 to 1997. He previously served on the Rural Sociology and Sociology faculties, respectively, of Cornell University (1988-1992), and The University of Texas at Austin (1970-1988), where he was also affiliated with the Population Research Center (University of Texas) and the Population and Development Program and the East Asia Studies Program (Cornell University). He was Chair of the Department of Rural Sociology at Cornell University from 1989 to 1992, and he was Director of the Population Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin from 1981 to 1986.

His research interests include demography and human ecology, with special attention to the populations of China, Taiwan, and Korea. In his 49 years as a professor, he served as the Chair of over 60 doctoral student committees, including over 40 at Texas A&M University. In his career as a professor he taught demography, statistics and sociology classes to over 4,500 undergraduate and graduate students.

Dr. Poston was a founding member of the Southern Demographic Association (SDA) and served  as SDA President during 1975-1977. He served as President (2004-2005) of the Southwestern Social Science Association. He served (1995-1998) as the President of Research Committee 41 (Sociology of Population) of the International Sociological Association. He served (1995-1997) as President of the North American Chinese Sociologists Association. He served as President of the Southwestern Sociological Association in 1983-1984. He has been elected to membership in Alpha Kappa Delta (1964), Gamma Sigma Delta (1991), Phi Beta Delta (1993), Phi Kappa Phi (1999), and the Sociological Research Association (1984).

Dr. Poston has co-authored/edited twenty-four books. His most recent books are the third edition of “Population and Society: An introduction to Demography” (2025) with Teresa Sullivan, “Applied Regression Models in the Social Sciences” (2024) with Eugenia Conde and Layton Field, and the second edition of “Handbook of Population” (2019). He has also published over 400 refereed journal articles, chapters and commentaries on various sociological and demographic topics.

He has been the principal/co-principal investigator of research grants awarded by the National Science Foundation (1976-78; 1979-80), the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (1979-80; 1981-82; 1981-84; 1982-84; 1986-88; 1989-93), the Office of Adolescent Pregnancy (1983-87); the Social Science Research Council (1987-88), the Ford Foundation (1989-90), the Rockefeller Foundation (1989-91), the New York Lung Association (1990-92), and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (2009-2012).

Dr. Poston was born in San Francisco, California on November 29, 1940. He attended a Catholic seminary in his first few years of high school, and then transferred to St. Ignatius High School (in San Francisco) from where he graduated in 1958. He graduated from the University of San Francisco in 1963 with a B.A. degree in Sociology, from San Francisco State College in 1967 with an M.A. degree in Sociology, and from the University of Oregon (in Eugene, Oregon) in 1968 with a Ph.D. degree in Sociology and Demography. He served on active duty in the U.S. Army as a First Lieutenant and as a Captain from 1968 to 1970, including a tour of nearly one full year in 1969-1970 in South Vietnam. Among his military honors and awards are the Bronze Star Medal, two Army Commendation Medals, the Vietnam Service Medal, and the Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal.

Dr. Poston married Patricia Mary Joyce Poston (also a native San Franciscan) in San Francisco, California in 1963. They have two children, Nancy Kathleen Poston Espey of San Antonio (born in San Francisco in 1964), and Dudley L. Poston III of Ambler, PA (born in San Francisco in 1966). Their family also includes their son-in-law Richard W. Espey (born in Texas in 1962), their daughter-in-law Dana Wizeman (born in Brooklyn in 1971), six grandchildren, David L. Espey (born in Texas in 1991), Kara Margaret Espey Osburn (born in Texas in 1994), Daniel Lee Espey (born in South Korea in 2001), Christopher Wizeman (born in Brooklyn in 1998), Joseph Wizeman (born in New Jersey in 2004), William Wizeman (born in New Jersey in 2010), and two great grandchildren, Malcolm Osburn (born in Texas in 2022), and Eva Osburn (born in Texas in 2025).