Larissa Jennings Mayo-Wilson, PhD, MHS, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Health Behavior at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Gillings School of Global Public Health, contributing significantly to Health Science through her expertise in sexual and reproductive health. She earned her PhD in Population, Family, and Reproductive Health and MHS in International Health from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in 2009 and 2005, respectively, and a BA in Social Anthropology from Harvard University in 2001. Her research specializations include improving sexual and reproductive health outcomes, including HIV prevention, among adolescents and young adults with low economic status and unmet needs. Jennings Mayo-Wilson examines economic and environmental interventions such as microenterprise, cash transfers, savings groups, financial incentives, and employment support to address sexual health inequities in the U.S. and sub-Saharan Africa. She also investigates mechanisms linking economic factors to health outcomes, the impact of economic violence and policies like paid leave on care-seeking, and self-care approaches including STI self-testing, fertility self-injection, pregnancy monitoring, and HIV PrEP/ART self-medication in high-poverty, low-access communities. As Faculty Fellow at the Carolina Population Center, Research Fellow at the Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research, and Adjunct Associate Professor in Obstetrics and Gynecology at the UNC School of Medicine, she leads NIH-funded projects such as the ENSPIRE R01 trial on education and employment for HIV prevention, the SECURE R34 on economic interventions for women, the WELLFUL study on work arrangements and health, and the ACHIEVE sub-study on IVF experiences.

Prior to her 2022 appointment at UNC, Jennings Mayo-Wilson was Associate Professor at Indiana University School of Public Health (2019–2022) and Assistant Professor at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (2012–2018), where she developed her research portfolio and taught courses on qualitative methods and economic interventions for sexual health. She has received major awards including the Gillings School Teaching Innovation Award (2025), NIH Mentored Research Scientist Career Development Award K01 (2020), NIH Health Disparities Research Loan Repayment Awards (2018, 2016), Golden Apple Excellence in Teaching Award (2015), and NIH PRIDE and HPTN Scholar Awards (2015, 2014). Her scholarship has over 4,000 citations on Google Scholar, with key publications such as "Impact of a Family Economic Intervention (Bridges) on Health and Behavioral Outcomes: A Randomized Clinical Trial" (American Journal of Public Health, 2021), "U.S. Transgender Women’s Preferences for Microeconomic Interventions to Enhance Engagement in HIV Care" (AIDS Patient Care and STDs, 2021), and "Examining Cash Expenditures and Associated HIV-Related Outcomes Among Young Adult Women Who Exchange Sex" (International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2023). She serves as Associate Editor for the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute and advises the National Working Positive Coalition and Adolescent Trials Network.

Professional Email: ljennings.mayowilson@unc.edu