I’m a postdoc at the Annenberg School for Communication and Polarization Research Lab at the University of Pennsylvania. My research examines the political information ecosystem, with particular attention to the interplay between new technology and information dissemination, incentives in the attention economy, and public opinion. My research also highlights the methodological and normative challenges of using big data and machine learning, such as sampling biases, data dependencies, and explainability, and addresses these directly as part of a broader commitment to responsible computation in the social sciences.
I received my PhD in Social and Engineering Systems in 2024 at MIT where my work and path to graduate school were featured in MIT News. Before receiving my PhD I worked in Cloudflare’s DC Office as a Policy Analyst where I focused on corporate social responsibility, namely organizing Project Galileo and the Athenian Project. I graduated from Harvard in 2017 with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and a minor in Government.
In college I was a letter winner on the Harvard-Radcliffe Lightweight Rowing Team and in my spare time I’ve coached high school rowing for Bethesda Chevy Chase High School and group fitness in DC, Boston, and now Philadelphia.
erinewalk[@]gmail[.]com
Erin Walk 