Dr. Suruchi Sood is a senior scientist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Department of Health, Behavior and Society and director of communication science at the Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs (CCP). With more than 25 years of expertise in health communication, social behavior change, and program evaluation, she is an internationally recognized leader in the field. Dr. Sood earned her Ph.D. in intercultural communication from the University of New Mexico and has served on faculty at Drexel University and Johns Hopkins. Her research addresses critical global health issues, with a focus on maternal and child health, violence against children, and social norms change.

Dr. Sood has led large-scale research and evaluation projects for UNICEF, USAID, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. She is widely known for developing the ACT Framework, a groundbreaking tool for measuring social norms change around female genital mutilation, which earned UNICEF’s Best of Research Award in 2022. With more than 40 peer-reviewed publications, two books, and numerous book chapters, her work has had significant impact.

She has been recognized with the American Public Health Association’s Everett M. Rogers Award (2019) and Drexel University’s Golden Apple Award for teaching excellence. Dr. Sood also co-chairs the Evidence for Impact cluster of the Global Alliance for Social and Behavior Change, where she advances the field through research, teaching, and global consultancy.