Dr. Marshall is a Senior Research Scientist at the Wellesley Centers for Women, as well as an Adjunct Associate Professor Emerita at Wellesley College. She received her doctorate from Harvard University in 1984. Her research at the Wellesley Centers for Women, where she leads  the Work, Families & Children team, is concentrated in two areas: studies of women and employment, with a focus on working conditions and health and on work-family systems, and studies of child care policy and early care and education. Dr. Marshall also teaches courses in Women's and Gender Studies on gender, employment and the sociology of children and youth.

Dr. Marshall’s research has been supported by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, the Administration for Children, Youth and Families, and the National Institute on Aging, as well as state government, private foundations and non-profit organizations. She is co-editor of Working Families: the Transformation of the American Home, and author of numerous peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters, including “Health and Illness Issues Facing an Aging Workforce in the New Millennium,” in Sociological Spectrum; “The Quality of Early Child Care and Children’s Development,” in Current Directions in Psychological Science; and “Gender Equity in Early Childhood Education,” in NAEYC’s A World of Difference: Readings on Teaching Young Children in a Diverse Society. 

Dr. Marshall’s reports on early care and education in Massachusetts, including "Preparing the Early Care and Education Workforce: The Capacity of Massachusetts’ Institutions of Higher Education," "The Cost and Quality of Full-Day Year-Round Early Care and Education in Massachusetts: Infant and Toddler Classrooms," and other Cost/Quality reports, are available from the Work, Families and Children website.