Timea Balogh (PhD candidate) and Professor James Adams, along with co-authors Will Horne, Simon Weschle, and Christopher Wlezien, recently published an article in the Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties, titled "Does political sophistication moderate how citizens use information to infer left-right distances between parties?" Much prior research examines what shapes citizens’ perceptions of parties’ positions, including histories of co-governance, the left-right tone of their election manifestos, and media reports of their public interactions.

UC Davis PhD alumni continue excellent streak of academic placements, including Dylan Forrester (2025 PhD) as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Bergen; Menglin (Miley) Liu (2025 PhD) as an Assistant Professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong; RyuGyung (Rio) Park (2025 PhD) as an Assistant Professor at The College of William & Mary; Ray Brandt (2024 PhD) as a Visiting Assistant Professor at University of North Florida; Jonathan Colner (2024 PhD) as an Assistant Professor at American University; Rana McReynolds as an Assistant Professor at Cal Poly

PhD candidate Yu-Shiuan Huang has been awarded the Rapoport Family Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Survey Research Grant (DDSRG) to support her research on the relationship between affective polarization and (anti)democratic attitudes. Her project examines why electoral winners are more willing to support democratic norm violations. Her findings suggest that winners are less likely to assess norm-eroding policies through strategic political calculations.

Professor Satkunanandan was featured on a recent CBC radio episode, where she elaborates the Nietzschean practice of "passing by" and its relevance to the question of whether to engage in dialogue. https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/nietzsche-passing-by-healthy-discourse-1.7434781

With the Trump administration back in office, news outlets including the Los Angeles Times, Newsweek, and the Washington Post have interviewed Professor Brad Jones, seeking his expertise on immigration policy. https://bradjones.faculty.ucdavis.edu/selected-media-appearances/

Faculty Lecturer Spencer Kiesel and recent Ph.D. graduate Sharif Amlani have published an article in PLOS ONE that introduces a new measure for affect that captures the motivation underpinning partisans’ attitudes. The new measure asks respondents for one-word to describe voters in their party and the opposing party. Then respondents code the sentiment behind their word choice themselves. This two-part measure produces qualitative and quantitative measures of respondents’ affect.

Assistant Professor Juan Tellez was awarded the UC Davis Graduate Program Advising and Mentoring Award, recognizing faculty who provide outstanding service in advising and mentoring at the program level. Congratulations, Professor Tellez!

Political Science Professor & Co-Chair Ethan Scheiner’s latest book, Freedom to Win: A Cold War Story of the Courageous Hockey Team That Fought the Soviets for the Soul of Its People—And Olympic Gold, was one of just eight nonfiction books listed among the University of California’s “Notable UC books of 2024,” which highlights “some of the year’s most critically acclaimed works, including National Book Award winners, Pulitzer Prize winners, New York Times bestsellers and Oprah picks, all from UC alums or faculty.”