About me

Hello! I’m a Research Data Scientist at the Research Triangle Institute (RTI)’s Center for Data Science and AI. I’m also a PhD Candidate in Informatics at Indiana University’s Center for Complex Networks and Systems (CNetS) working primarily with the Observatory on Social Media (OSoMe).

At RTI I apply state-of-the-art methods in data science, statistics, and AI to help researchers across various domains. I aim to work primarily on research projects related to public health or climate change.

In recent months I have been involved in multiple projects assessing the capabilities of Large Language Models (LLMs) like ChatGPT and their suitability for various research tasks across the Institute.

My PhD work is focused on measuring the offline effects of online social media. I have defined a method for linking online causes to offline outcomes with modern data science tools and causal inference methods, and I demonstrate the method through some case studies. One case study focuses on assessing the impact of antivaccine tweets on vaccine uptake during the 2021 COVID vaccine rollout, using the CoVaxxy dataset I previously contributed to building. Another project looks at how legislative discourse in the UK Parliament follows the topics discussed on social media. Overall, I find that social media does have impacts on political discourse, public health outcomes, and individuals’ attention and sentiments.