Undergraduate students interested in conducting original research should consider the political science honors program. During their senior year students in the honors program write a thesis on a topic of their choosing while being supervised by a political science faculty member.
Award Winning Thesis Projects
| Year | Thesis Title | Author (Student) | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | There's No "I" in Erdoğan: Predicting Power Personalization with Pronoun Usage in Turkey | Emily Sallenback | Avital Livny |
| 2022 | Use of Force in the BLM Era: How High-Profile Citizen-Killings by Police Affect Use of Force Outcomes in Dallas, Texas | Thomas Ballard | Scott Althaus |
| 2022 | AmeriCAN I…?” : The Effect of the Strength of American Identity on Civic Participation in Second-Generation Americans | Tyeese Braslavsky | Cara Wong |
| 2021 | Who Does the Rule of Law Rule Out? Examining the Access to Justice for Victims in Post-Conflict Colombia | Jessica Angel | Alyssa Prorok |
| 2019 | Rising Temperatures and Inequality: Collective Action in a Changing World | Rebecca Laurent | Robert Pahre and Daniel Miller |
| 2018 | Personality's Role within the World's Greatest Deliberative Body: How the "Big Five" Factors Drive the Rise of United States Senators to Legislative Success | Matthew Rice | Jeffery Mondak |
| 2017 | Intraparty Factions and Interparty Polarization | Collin Schumock | Gisela Sin |
| 2016 | From the Washington to the Beijing Consensus: China's Economic Rise and the IMF | John Knoblett | Xinyuan Dai |
| 2015 | A Perpetuating Negative Cycle: The Effects of Economic Inequality on Voter Participation | Jenine Saleh | Thomas Rudolph |
2022-2023 Thesis Projects
| Thesis Title | Author (Student) | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|
|
Motivations Behind Voter Mobilization Post-Dobbs Decision |
Claire Accardo | Cara Wong |
|
Supreme Court Legitimacy and the Impacts of Perceived Politicization |
Nicole B Arnold | Alicia Uribe-McGuire |
|
Exploring Conflict Engagement: The Impact of Age on the Conflict Engagement of Government Leaders |
Anna Blair | Alyssa Prorok |
|
Money or Morals? The Use of Violence by Rebel Groups Faced with New Resource Flows |
Ryan Coady | Alyssa Prorok |
|
University Ideology Relating to Sexual Misconduct Policies |
Claire Fleming | Robert Pahre |
|
The Power of an Individual's Socialization: Why Racial Identity Impacts Americans' Perceptions of Which Political Issues Are Most Important |
Sotirios Gouriotis | Robert Carroll |
|
Cops, Courts, and Confidence: How Police Interactions Affect Public Trust in the Judiciary |
Emma Henderson | Jeff Mondak |
|
Motivations for Nuclear Renunciation: When Do States Give Up Nuclear Weapons? |
Nick Larson | Nicholas Grossman |
|
Political Messaging Receptivity Among American Age Demographics |
Olivia Lynch | Thomas Rudolph |
|
Rising up, for One Less: Examining Feminicide and Mobilization in Colombia |
Melany Montesdeoca | Damarys Canache |
|
Ideological Polarization: Political Division in Activists and the Masses |
Zheng Yuan Mor | Thomas Rudolph |
|
Public Involvement in Agency Rulemaking: How State Agricultural Output Impacts Public Participation in the Notice-and-Comment Process |
Mariama Mwilambwe | Brian Gaines & Carmen Ugarte |
|
ReACTION: The Effect of Online Emotions on Offline Conviction Towards Social Movements |
Jasmine Ng | Jake Bowers |
|
There's No "I" in Erdoğan: Predicting Power Personalization with Pronoun Usage in Turkey |
Emily Sallenback | Avital Livny |
|
“High Stakes Finance”: How Battlefield Outcomes Affect Rebel Group Financing |
Sonja Shirkevich | Alyssa Prorok |
|
Political will, not capacity: refugee reception policymaking in Poland |
Nicole Ward | Rana Khoury |
Best Thesis Award and Poster Award Winner: Emily Sallenback
| Thesis Title | Author (Student) | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|
| Migration and Democracy in the European Union | Rumeysa Aydogdu | Cara Wong |
|
Use of Force in the BLM Era: How High-Profile Citizen-Killings by Police Affect Use of Force Outcomes in Dallas, Texas |
Thomas Ballard | Scott Althaus |
|
Being Left Behind: Disseminating Populist Rhetoric on Twitter |
Jacob Berlinger | Nora Webb Williams |
|
Foucault, Power, and Public Health Disparities |
Shivani Bhogaraju | Samantha Frost |
|
AmeriCAN I…?” : The Effect of the Strength of American Identity on Civic Participation in Second-Generation Americans |
Tyeese Braslavsky | Cara Wong |
|
Party Systems and Climate Change Mitigation |
Gina Fumagalli | Xinyuan Dai |
|
Factors in State-Level Native American Voter Suppression |
Jake Gulick | Robert Pahre |
|
Maintaining Legitimacy in Crises: Examining EU Citizens' Trust |
Melisa Ilkhan | Konstantinos Kourtikakis |
|
The CCP's Greatest Hits: An Analysis of Personalism and Propaganda Music |
Kaylynn Kattiyaman | Yujeong Yang |
|
Violence Against Land Defenders in Colombia |
Ari Kelo | Mckenzie Johnson |
|
Autonomous Civil Society Organizations in Authoritarian Regimes: A Case Study of China |
Edward Kim | Yujeong Yang |
|
Identity and Politics: The Mechanisms Behind Politically Motivated Covid-19 Behavior |
Katherine King | Avital Livny |
|
Partisanship and Progeny: The Effect of Political Polarization on Perceptions of Family Functioning |
Jane Knight | Thomas Rudolph |
|
The Fight for Gideon: Public Defense Resources and Its Impact on Incarceration |
Zachary Kowalski | Alicia Uribe-McGuire |
|
The RFRA Arrowhead: Understanding State Level Religious Liberty |
Matthew Krauter | Alicia Uribe-McGuire |
|
Behind the Barred Felon Vote: Political Implications of Felon Disenfranchisement |
Isabel Launspach | Jeff Mondak |
|
A Justification for Paternalism: Identifying the Good of Subjective and Objective Ends |
Alice Lee | Benjamin Miller |
|
Patterns of Influence: How Governments Utilize Minority Targeting Propaganda Campaigns |
Benjamin Nathan | Alyssa Prorok |
|
The Impact of Changes in the Law on the “Court of Public Opinion” |
Adem Osmani | Jake Bowers |
|
Women Belong in the House (and the Senate): An Analysis of the Impact of Gender and Occupation on Legislative Effectiveness in the United States Senate |
Steph Petrov | Gisela Sin |
|
Deplatforming the Alt-Right: A Study of Hate Speech and Twitter Bans |
Malia Sayad | Nicholas Grossman |
|
When Fact-Checks Fail: Instilling Social Responsibility on Social Media |
Alexandra Simon | Thomas Rudolph |
| Corporations, Personhood, and the Right to Bend the Law | Clay Ward | Samantha Frost |
Best Poster Award Winners: Kaylynn Kattiyaman
Best Thesis Award Winners: Thomas Ballard and Tyeese Braslavsky
| Thesis Title | Author (Student) | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|
|
Who Does the Rule of Law Rule Out? Examining the Access to Justice for Victims in Post-Conflict Colombia |
Jessica Angel |
Alyssa Prorok |
|
Egotism: American Refugee Politics |
Arnoldo Ayala |
Cara Wong |
|
Reputation and Rivalry: How Reputation Building Leads to Conflict |
Christopher Buckley |
Robert Carroll |
|
Four Horsemen of the Populist |
Hannah Buzil |
Thomas Rudolph |
|
Coronavirus and IOs: How the Pandemic has Affected American Attitudes Towards the WHO and Other International Institutions |
Mark Choate |
Robert Pahre |
|
A Rawlsian Justification for International Climate Agreements |
Kimmy Chuang |
Benjamin Miller |
|
Faction Effectiveness in the House of Representatives |
Naomi Maehr |
Gisela Sin |
|
Neoliberalism and Clinical Labor |
Kassidy Mahoney |
Samantha Frost |
|
Crime and the Electoral Outcomes of Progressive Prosecution |
Ali Mirza |
Alicia Uribe-McGuire |
| Time, Motivation and Politics: How the COVID-19 Pandemic Increased Political Participation | Halle Noone | Jake Bowers |
| Who Picks WHO: Accessing Foreign Policy Attitudes Towards Vaccine Development | Ami Punatar | Aleksander Ksiazkewicz |
| The Role of Context in the Partisan Divide Over COVID | Jason Reed | Scott Althaus |
| The Hidden Underbelly of Neoliberalism: How Neo-Utilitarianism Makes the System Work | Kyra Sadovi | Samantha Frost |
| Mental Health in a Modern Democracy: How Anxiety Impacts American College Students’ Political Behavior | Aishwarya Shekara | Jeff Mondak |
| Beneficiaries and Project Outcomes: The Role of Aid Beneficiaries in the Success of Sustainable Agricultural Projects | William Smithson | Daniel Miller |
| Who Participates? Latinx Identity Preferences and Their Impact on Civic Engagement and Political Participation | Estrella Vazquez-Hernandez | Cara Wong |
| The Identity Crisis in Europe: Analyzing EU Enlargement, Turkey and Cultural Convergence | Hannah Wernecke | Konstantinos Kourtikakis |
Best Thesis Presentation Award (in place of “Best Thesis Poster”): Jessica Angel
Best Thesis Award: Jessica Angel
View presentation videos here.
| Thesis Title | Author (Student) | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|
|
It’s My Party and I’ll Switch if I Want To: Electoral Impacts of Party Defection by MPs in the UK House of Commons, 2010-2019 |
Jackson Barnett |
Carol Leff |
|
Making Friends and Influencing People: The Effects of Social Media Networks on Subjective Political Knowledge |
Jonathan Bonaguro |
Scott Althaus |
|
Disinterested: The Role of Rational Self-Interest in White Working Class Attitudes Towards the Affordable Care Act |
Joseph Dillier |
Cara Wong |
|
A (Manly) Man’s Game: Masculinity, Gender Threat, and Political Participation |
Casey J. Griffin |
Aleksander Ksiazkiewicz |
|
Social Movements, Party-fit and Female Representation |
Millie G Johnson |
Thomas Rudolph |
|
What Happens When the Cavalry Actually Comes?: Investigating Relationships between Intervention, Grievance Type, and Conflict Intensity during Civil Wars |
Corbin Kakac |
Nicholas Grossman |
|
Revisiting Ethnic Social Identification Theory |
Chih-Ming (Louis) Lee |
Avital Livny |
|
Public Opinion and Minority Rights after the EU’s 2004 Enlargement |
Miranda MacNaughton |
Carol Leff |
|
Variety in U.S. Intervention: Middle Eastern and North African Conflicts Since 2003 |
Sophia Wickum |
Nicholas Grossman |
Best Thesis Presentation Award (in place of “Best Thesis Poster”): Casey J. Griffin & Jonathan Bonaguro
| Thesis Title | Author (Student) | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|
|
Sexual Exploitation and Abuse in UN Peacekeeping: An Intersectional Approach |
Nair Marie Banks III |
Samantha Frost |
|
Territorial Claims and the Avoidance of War and Militarized Interstate Disputes
|
Yixin Bao |
John Vasquez |
|
Reexamining de facto power in Acemoglu & Robinson’s Autocratic Society: Differentiating Coercive Force from Collective Action |
Joshua Bi |
Avital Livny |
|
The Electoral Effects of Religious Homogeneity |
Adam Camp |
Thomas Rudolph |
|
Paying More for Politics: The Extent to Which Political Ideology Influences Spending Choices |
James Jones |
Aleksander Ksiazkiewicz |
|
Rising Temperatures and Inequality: Collective Action in a Changing World |
Rebecca Laurent |
Robert Pahre and Daniel Miller |
|
Rural Resentment and the Urban/Rural Divide: An Empirical Test |
Zion C. Little |
Jake Bowers |
|
Race and Redistricting: Does Gerrymandering affect Ethnic Representation? |
Peter C. Miller |
Brian Gaines |
|
Women and The House: Transformative And Transactional Leadership Styles On The Path To The United States House Of Representatives |
Sara O'Malley |
Gisela Sin |
|
The Ramifications of Social Media: Differentiating Truths from Falsities and Facts from Opinions |
Valerie Peterson |
Thomas Rudolph |
|
"Not My Justice": Affective Polarization and the Legitimacy of the United States Supreme Court |
James Grant Semonin |
Jeffery Mondak |
|
Trust in the European Union: Effect of Energy, Refugees, & Distance |
Colin A Staske |
Kostas Kourtikakis |
Best Poster award winners: Rebecca Laurent and Valerie Peterson
Best Thesis award winner: Rebecca Laurent (Honorable Mentions: Adam Camp, Sara O'Malley, and Valerie Peterson)
| Thesis Title | Author (Student) | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|
| The Violence of Religious Difference: A Study of Civil War Onset | Ljubica Basica | Alyssa Prorok |
| The Effect of Party Turnover on Government Corruption | Thomas Bishop | Matthew Winters |
| Economic Interdependence and Probability of Conflict: Territorial Disputes as a Moderating Factor | Chase Bloch | John Vasquez |
| Investing in Science: Professionalization Effects on the Provision of Constituent Service | Thomas Dowling | Jake Bowers |
| Hierarchical Capture: Bridging the Gap in Analyses of the Bureaucracy | Stephen Duginger | Gisela Sin |
| The Impact of the Syrian Refugee Crisis on Immigration | Reema Ghabra | Avital Livny |
| Cooperation with International Environmental Agreements -- The Role of Regional Forms of Government | Gina Gonnella | Robert Pahre |
| Ideological Drift and the Personal Lives of Supreme Court Justices | Granger Gridley | Alicia Uribe-McGuire |
| Media Influence on Public Opinion: Civil Liberties vs. National Security | Cordelia Grob | Thomas Rudolph |
| When More Knowledge is Not Sufficient: Political Sophistication, Motivation & Ideological Constraint | Shawn Kim | Aleksander Ksiazkiewicz |
| Ethnic and Religious Discrimination: Is there a Difference | Autumn Langdon | Carol Leff |
| Going Viral: Characteristics of Newsworthy Tweets | Julia Nusgart | Scott Althaus |
| Racial Bias in Sentencing and Courts | Kanishk Patel | Alicia Uribe-McGuire |
| Revisiting the Effect of Presidential Approval: Observing the President Leveraging His Popularity | Christoper Piper | Gisela Sin |
| Personality's Role within the World's Greatest Deliberative Body: How the "Big Five" Factors Drive the Rise of United States Senators to Legislative Success | Matthew Rice | Jeffery Mondak |
| Who Would Have Won: Electing the President Through the Direct Vote, 1980-2016 | Jeff Talley | Brian Gaines |
| An Examination of NASA Funding: Causal Factors, Funding Trends, and the Implications of These Findings | Kevin Wenzel | Nicholas Grossman |
Matthew Rice was selected as the winner of Best Poster and Best Thesis for his project titled "Personality's Role within the World's Greatest Deliberative Body: How the "Big Five" Factors Drive the Rise of United States Senators to Legislative Success?"
| Thesis Title | Author (Student) | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|
| Investigating the Impact of Congressional Inconsistency | Ethan Amburgey | Brian Gaines |
| Campaign Messaging Strategies on Twitter | Amelia Berger | Scott Althaus |
| Representation of Racial and Ethnic Minorities in State Judiciaries | Nadia Gonzalez | Alicia Uribe-McGuire |
| Authoritarian to Democratic Transitions: The Impact of Legacies | Mandi Heitz | Sarah Hummel |
| The Effect of Ideology on Protest Behavior in Latin American Countries | James Holevas | Damarys Canache |
| Approaches to Education Policy and Refugee Outcomes in European Union States | Derek Hoot | Stephen Chaudoin |
| The Impact of Judicial Vacancies on Decision Quality | Peter Miles | Alicia Uribe-McGuire |
| World Wars: Investigating the Nature of World Wars, Why They Occur, and Why They Do Not | Moksha Muthukrishan | John Vasquez |
| Understanding the Brexit Referendum: Direct Democracy and International Regimes | Amy Radlinski | Konstantinos Kourtikakis |
| An Investigation of Third Party Voting in U.S. Presidential Elections | Aaron Reinsbach | Aleksander Ksiazkiewicz |
| Intraparty Factions and Interparty Polarization | Collin Schumock | Gisela Sin |
| Transformative Networks: The Case of North Caucasian and Central Asian Jihadist Networks | Caleb Weiss | Carol Skalnik Leff |
Thesis Award Winners
The 2016 Best Thesis award winner is Collin Schumock for his thesis "Intraparty Factions and Interparty Polarization."
The 2017 best poster award winner is Amy Radlinski for her thesis "Understanding the Brexit Referendum: Direct Democracy and International Regimes."
| Thesis Title | Author (Student) | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|
| An American Evolution of LGB Public Opinions | Jack Carrera | Samantha Frost |
| Analyzing Executive Action: The Signals and Conditions that Help Predict the Issuance of Executive Orders | Alison Casey | Gisela Sin |
| The Effects of Political Strategy on the United States' Aid Allocation | Naveed Cheraghchi | Matthew Winters |
| Campaign Finance: Effects on Voter Behavior and Opinion | Thomas Conroy | Jose Chiebub |
| The President vs. Congress: Agency Compliance and Control | Michelle Gong | Jennifer Selin |
| Big Interest Groups Making a Big Difference: Studying the Impact of Interest Groups on Agency Policymaking | Meredith Heim | Jennifer Selin |
| Gender and Committee Assignments in Congress | Marie Johnson-Dahl | Tracy Sulkin |
| From the Washington to the Beijing Consensus: China's Economic Rise and the IMF | John Knoblett | Xinyuan Dai |
| Oppression of the Devoted | Janice Lin | Avital Livny |
| Voting in Taiwan and China: A Comparative Analysis on the Impact of Educational Attainment on Voter Turnout in Taiwan and China | Mekenah Merrill | Sarah Hummel |
| Gender, Embodied Subjectivity, and Religion: A Challenge to Liberal Pluralism | Hana Nasser | Samantha Frost |
| The Northern Ireland Conflict and the Good Friday Accord | Farhan Patel | Carol Leff |
| An Analysis on Eminent Domain and the Supreme Court | Christopher Ponicki | Alicia Uribe |
| Nuclear Confrontations | Amrutha Prasad | John Vasquez |
| Public Goods Satisfaction and Participation of Indigenous People in Latin America | Alexandra Turcios | Damarys Canache |
Thesis Awards
The 2016 Best Thesis Award winner is John Knoblett for his thesis "From the Washington to the Beijing Consensus: China's Economic Rise and the IMF."
The 2016 Best Poster Award winner is Mekenah Merrill for her thesis poster, "Voting in Taiwan and China: A Comparative Analysis on the Impact of Educational Attainment on Voter Turnout in Taiwan and China."
| Thesis Title | Author (Student) | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|
| Supreme Court Justices' Response to Public Opinion | Ejulius Adorno | Alicia Uribe |
| Does Anti-Corruption Foreign Aid Reduce Corruption? | Ricardo Alvarez | Matthew Winters |
| Members of Congress and Congressional Staff Allocation | John Flach | Gisela Sin |
| Don't Bank On It: The Incomplete Truth of Money in Congressional Elections | Patrick Flavin | Brain Gaines |
| Progressive Ambition and Gender in Congress | Sarah Gortowski | Tracy Sulkin |
| Political Violence, Ethnic Fractionalization, and the Ratification of the Rome Statute | Ada Irem Karacal | Stephen Chaudoin |
| Rise of Nationalism in China and Japan: the Consequences on Domestic Politics and Sino-Japanese Relations | Joo Hoon Kim | Carol Leff |
| Personality and the Environment: How Internal Motivations Create Different Environmental Decisions | Lauren Krone | Robert Pahre |
| BREAKING (Network, Comedy, and Internet) NEWS: Differences in Memory and Perceived Credibility Across Media Platforms | Christina Lorey | Jeffery Mondak |
| The Head of State Effect: Discovering the Role of the Head of State in Cabinet Longevity | Quinn Marschik | Jose Cheibub |
| Implicit and Explicit Racial Messages and Their Effects On Citizens' Attitudes | Darrah Perryman | James Kuklinski |
| A Perpetuating Negative Cycle: The Effects of Economic Inequality on Voter Participation | Jenine Saleh | Thomas Rudolph |
| State's Attorney Gender and Rape Convictions | Richard Sledz | Joseph Hinchliffe |
Thesis Awards
The 2015 Best Thesis Award winner is Jenine Saleh for her thesis "A Perpetuating Negative Cycle: The Effects of Economic Inequality on Voter Participation."
The 2015 Best Poster Award winner is Irem Karacal for her poster presenting her thesis "Political Violence, Ethnic Fractionalization, and the Ratification of the Rome Statute."