PUBLICATIONS

Here, we reconcile millennia of scholarship to show that realist thought is not incompatible with the concept of soft power. In fact, the ideological ancestors of modern realists showed remarkable alignment with the neoliberal concept. We support theory presented by ancient realists and modern neoliberals with findings from social psychology and develop a framework for psychological significance. Using this framework, we demonstrate that psychologically significant visits by heads of state yield an increase in approval rate among the citizens of the host country over five times larger than routine visits. We take advantage of a natural experiment which allows us to isolate the effect of psychological mechanisms from military and economic forces. These findings should change how leaders interact with foreign publics, and also suggest changes in realist approaches to the study of power and a reconceptualization of soft power as social and cultural cognition.

Radical action is necessary to respond to modern threats to the legitimacy of science as a vocation. These challenges are hardly a new phenomenon, and science has responded to these critiques to varying success. Here, I conduct a normative analysis of the role science as a vocation is expected to fill in society, relating these expectations to recent criticism. Then, I suggest institutional and individual action which may revitalize and reorient science to fill the roles expected of it. This analysis is an important step in regaining the public trust, reputation, and status that science should hold.

Here I defend the uninformed voter and demonstrate that the modern vote should not be decided by individual policy issues. Critics of democracy correctly argue that individuals are unable to understand technical information required for all political decisions. However, in pure democracy, voters are expected to judge expert opinions rather than interpret information themselves. This makes voting a second-order decision. Then, critics may reasonably claim that the layman cannot hold the information necessary to judge expert opinion on all matters. However, voting in a democratic republic is a third order decision. Voters need only select a representative with good judgement rather than judge expert opinion. I develop a frame for candidate evaluation and suggest methods of reorienting public depictions of candidates, campaign policy, and civic education to better fit the citizen's goal in voting. I suggest empirical investigation of the layperson's ability to assess judgement and motivations behind candidate selection and approval ratings. I conclude by discussing this model relative to normative arguments for leader selection in different political systems.

Here, I suggest science abandon the illusion of rationality. Rationality has long been deemed virtuous, and in the same breath been associated with masculinity. When men are assumed rational and women irrational, one can easily find evidence to confirm this bias and disregard evidence that contradicts it (itself an example of motivated cognition). This led to millennia of exclusionary practices in various professions on the basis of sex. In addition to the sexism inherent to many conceptions of rationality, mounting evidence in psychology suggests that all human cognition is motivated in some way. Though critical readers can discern what is and is not empirically validated, few have the background or time to discern what is interpretation and what isn’t. Consumers of science take the words of experts at face value, and because they are experts, assume objective, rational interpretations. I suggest scientists strive to be conscious of the motivations of their own cognition rather than assume a rationality that cannot exist.