Payal is a Ph.D. candidate in the field of Applied Economics and Management. Her work is primarily focused on development economics and applied econometrics. As a Tata-Cornell Scholar, her fieldwork involves around 1000 households in 15 rural villages in India as she explores the linkages between sanitation and nutrition. 545 toilets have been built in the project villages with the aim of combating the rampant practice of open defecation using tools of behavior change communication and quantifying the impact of this intervention on the child health, sanitation practices, and the safety of women. Prior to joining Cornell, she graduated first in her class attaining a Bachelor’s in Economics from I.P College, Delhi University (DU) and ranked seventh in Delhi School of Economics, DU during her Master’s degree.