Biography

I am a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame and a PhD Fellow at the Kellogg Institute for International Studies. I study comparative politics and my interests lie at the intersection of political psychology and behavior, violence, and migration, with a regional focus on Latin America. I combine experimental and observational causal inference with a range of qualitative methods to understand intergroup relations in violent societies. My work has been published in Party Politics, Legislative Studies Quarterly (LSQ, x2), and Research and Politics. My research has been funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the American Political Science Association (APSA), Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA), Evidence in Governance and Politics (EGAP), and the Kellogg Institute, among others.

My research examines how theoretically-driven interventions sway citizens' altruistic and violent responses toward disadvantaged groups. My dissertation, “The Political Psychology of Criminal Violence and Solidarity with Victims,” uses field and survey experiments along with in-depth interviews and focus groups to map the causes and consequences for democracy that political solidarity and prejudice have in violent societies. Focusing on Mexico’s War on Drugs, I examine how personal narratives activate both positive emotions and behaviors toward stigmatized victims of human rights and iron fist demands to harshly punish perpetrators. In a related project, I similarly investigate which campaigns counter discrimination against undocumented migrants in Latin America.

I am also working on several projects examining the institutional origins of conflict, the politics of authoritarian regimes, and how institutions work under democracies.