Welcome! I am a PhD candidate in Political Psychology at the Department of Political Science in Stony Brook University, New York.

I take a keen interest in understanding and analyzing human attitudes, motivations and behavior, and applying them to real world tech products to solve critical issues. I have worked on several cross-disciplines projects with collaborators from business, engineering and urban planning. Some of the ongoing projects I am working on deal with civic-tech innovations, and impact of social vulnerability in post-disaster recovery.

By training, I am a mixed methods researcher with extensive experience in both quantitative and qualitative methods. Across several end-to-end research projects, I have used quantitative methods like experimental designs, survey designs, interrupted time series, linear and logistic models, exploratory analysis, and qualitative methods like semi-structured interviews.

My doctoral project focuses on the psychological underpinnings of collective action on climate change. More specifically, I study the effectiveness of communications designed to increase attendance at collective action events. I have conducted a series of survey experiments to examine two types of goal-directed mobilization frames – specific and abstract – to motivate collective efficacy and climate action. I distinguish between messages that emphasize specific objectives from more abstract goals to determine which is more effective in promoting collective action. A specific mobilization frame is one that links collective action to the passage of a specific climate legislation bill. In contrast, an abstract frame is one that emphasizes the need to take urgent climate action without specifying a specific policy outcome. To gain a deeper understanding regarding the scope of specific goals in motivating collective efficacy, I further examine specific goals with broad and narrow policy benefits, distinguishing between climate policies that benefit citizens and those designed to benefit businesses. In addition, I analyze interviews with climate activists to understand the role played by specific and abstract climate-related goals in driving their activism. Using qualitative interviews helps substantiate the findings from the survey experiments, increasing the internal and external validity of my findings.