Can LLM-based 'silicon samples' accurately reflect human decisionmaking in conjoint tasks? The short answer is "not really" -- but there's more to the story. I'll be presenting my paper on synthetic sampling in conjoint experiments tomorrow at 10! #APSA2025

I am on the academic job market this fall! I study how Americans perceive and react to policy extremism, experimental design, & machine learning/AI. More about me, including my CV, research/teaching interests, & links to papers/code on my website: alicemalmberg.com

Attending #MPSA2025 and studying dem backsliding, or something having implications for it, like #disinfo? Join us for an impromptu HH at chicagoathletichotel.com on 12 S Mich Av on April 3rd at 6 pm! Cool bar area upstairs. Last year's event was a hit! @MPSAnet @alicemalmberg.bsky.social

I’m so excited to discuss how perceptions of extremist abortion laws shape Americans’ relocation preferences at 3pm ET tomorrow! You can read my working paper here: drive.google.com/file/d/1erIp...

Come hang out with me on February 5 to talk about how Americans’ perceptions of extremist policies shape where they choose to live!

This is everything

Christmas dinner with people I just met: Them: What do you do? Me: I’m in grad school Them: For what? Me: To become a professor Them: What kind of professor? Me: A social scientist Them: What? Me: *braces for impact* I study political science Them: WELL HOW ABOUT THAT ELECTION

It looks like I’ve gained some followers on here, so a quick reintroduction: I’m a political science Ph.D. candidate at UC Davis. I study how Americans perceive and respond to extremist state policies, as well as AI integration in survey methods.

“I was Supposed to be Writing a Paper, but Instead I Booked Flights for 3 Trips” - a memoir and original screenplay, by me starring me

A great day presenting and learning at the first ever Bay Area Polarization Workshop with colleagues from Davis, Berkeley, and Stanford. Thank you to @marcjacob.bsky.social for organizing!

💥New WMP Report: Biden airs $13m in broadcast ads since Super Tuesday.  Trump campaign has none. @tnridout.bsky.social @efranklinfowler.bsky.social & Michael Franz w/ @opensecretsdc.bsky.social Read the full report here: mediaproject.wesleyan.edu/releases-052... polisky polcom #commsky

UNC is secretly recording classes without informing professors and using the footage in formal reviews of their performance. www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty...

Eggs: none Steak: medium Milk: 2% Alcohol: whiskey or tequila Warm drink: espresso, always

Quick litmus test to check if you drink too much caffeine: mention to coworkers that you’ve heard of a new drink called a “Black Widow” (4 shots of espresso in a cup of black coffee). If they all yell “NO!” at the same time, you may have a problem.

Polisky - anyone have ideas for organizations/grants that might fund a democracy/backsliding happy hour at APSA? We have proof of concept from MPSA that there is interest in this, and I’d love to be able to actually buy people’s drinks next time.

Top Republicans, led by Trump, refuse to commit to accept 2024 election results www.washingtonpost.com/elections/20...

In case it wasn’t already obvious I’m from DC I got yelled at for checking my email at a wedding reception last night

We have a group working to update CongressData (& the Correlates of State Policy) this summer: What member, district, or legislative variables would you like added? Do you have data you would like to connect? Respond here or email [email protected]

Today in on-the-nose photojournalism.

I’ve really resonated with the Mary Oliver poem “The Journey” throughout grad school. When I advanced to candidacy last week my amazing friend @dantecade.bsky.social had the opening line engraved on a letter opener. “One day you finally knew what you had to do and began.”

Did not have “finalize my entire dissertation committee” on my list of things to do today (or even this month), but here we are. Thank you, university bureaucracy!

A lot of the current POTUS race narrative is likely being driven by low propensity voters. If you shift from "hasn't voted in last 3 elections" to "has voted in all 3 of last elections" it goes from Trump 44 Biden 26 to Trump 39 Biden 50 abcnews.go.com/538/vote-bac...

Today I became a PhD candidate (!) My top takeaway from the past 3 years is to know yourself. Know your motivations. Know your strengths and weaknesses. Most importantly, know what you are capable of. Know you get to define that for yourself as long as you put in the work and never give up.

the ironic thing about “college is for wages only” is that the liberal arts idea of getting a broad, well rounded education is actually quite useful in the job market!

In other words:

So excited this is finally out and that a UCD colleague and I could contribute! For anyone interested, here is a link to our replication’s discussion paper, published last June: ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/i4rdps...

I keep thinking of the young voter who told NYT she thought Biden had overturned Roe. Very little understanding of what’s happening out there.

Thank you to everyone who came out for the first ever MPSA backsliding happy hour tonight! We had a good turnout and some wonderful conversations.

Friendly reminder that this is tomorrow at MPSA! Polisky

Maine's Democratic legislature just gave final approval to this bill to join the National Popular Vote Compact for the Electoral College. Democratic Gov. Janet Mills has not yet said whether she will sign or veto it www.mainepublic.org/politics/202...

Polisky folks going to MPSA!! Some other grad students and I are putting together a happy hour for folks interested in doing democratic backsliding work. 5pm on Friday at Boleo (122 W Monroe) — before the mentoring reception. All subfields are welcome. See you there!

A few days late, but I had an amazing time sharing my work at the NYU-CESS Conference on Experimental Political Science last weekend. Super great event!

Loving how random my MPSA placement is. After 4 papers seemingly about electoral institutions in the states — strap in, folks, for an experiment on mass attitudes toward geographic sorting! 😜

Serious question - what do people with 8GB RAM computers (especially Macs) do when analyzing big data sets/using machine learning methods? Do y’all just invest in a more powerful computer? Been in the Apple ecosystem forever but a higher RAM Mac is way out of budget as a grad student. Polisky

Niche rant but can we as a society collectively decide which messaging app to use? Was asked to download Telegram to help plan an upcoming trip. Group is now using WhatsApp. Someone asked me to install Signal the other day as well. IMO using multiple apps means more missed texts!

Never forget that last year Theda Skocpol came to the aid of a letter carrier attacked by turkeys www.nbcboston.com/news/local/t...

"A key finding is that 48% of all episodes of autocratization become democratic turnarounds, which increases to 70% when focusing on the last 30 years. The vast majority of democratic turnarounds (93 percent) lead to restored or even improved levels of democracy."

This baby political scientist got her very first R&R today!!

For everyone who thinks political fundraising emails are excessive and annoying — may I introduce…emails from car dealerships.

. @smotus.bsky.social's Tusk Substack is always worth reading, but particularly this update, which includes a spot-on comparison of a Trump Rally and a Dead show. smotus.substack.com/p/three-cand...

Also considering that local media closures polarize voting behavior doi.org/10.1093/joc/..., reduce civic engagement https://doi:10.1086/679749, doi-org.proxy1.library.jhu.edu/10.1080/1058..., and nationalize politics press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

What I’m realizing about the academic path is that there are high stakes moments when you think you are at your breaking point. And, sometimes, you need to push through the exhaustion and find it in yourself to work a little bit harder. And then you rest. One more week until I can finally rest.

“A very common theme in the history of fascism is that lots of people think that the fascist leader is joking,” he says. “I mean, it wouldn’t be fascism without that feature.”

Could we have a day where we didn't talk about the Ivy League? Just one single solitary day where we think about the other 99% of higher ed in the US?

"Contemporary discourse often pits Muslims & Jews against one another. But our research demonstrates that a large amount of seemingly disconnected hateful rhetoric about both—at least in 2017—originated from the same far-right extremist communities" | The Same Extremists Target Both Muslims and Jews

Fewer than half of Republicans (47%) now say that science has had a mostly positive effect on society. In 2019, 70% of Republicans said this. 🧪 www.pewresearch.org/science/2023...

Do you clean data in R? Stop renaming, reordering, or dropping variables manually. Automate the work with your data dictionary. #rstats cghlewis.com/blog/dict_cl...