I am Associate Professor at The Institute for Analytical Sociology (IAS) and Professor of Sociology at Leipzig University. I am member of the steering group of the Swedish Excellence Center for Computational Science, Vice-President of the International Network of Analytical Sociology, and elected fellow of the European Academy of Sociology.
At the IAS, I lead three research groups:
The text analysis group studies dynamics of public discourse. Funded by a generous grant from the Swedish Research Council, we develop machine-learning applications for the large-scale analysis of text in sociology. Using digitized corpora as social sensors, our research explores swings in public opinion and the transmission of shared interpretations of societal developments and events.
The cultural dynamics group looks at cultural markets and social media platforms as testbeds for socially influenced behavior. One important research question is whether social influence is powerful enough to change people’s behavior—and thus render collective outcomes socially produced. Other research questions concern the spread of misinformation and the politicization of culture.
The spatial inequality group investigates the self-reinforcing dynamics of urban growth, the pace of life in cities, and the escalating urban-rural divide in economic prosperity and individual life chances. We explore the increasingly uneven economic geography observed in many countries in which cities’ attraction of talent and big cities’ extreme diversity add to growing levels of inequality between smaller and larger urban areas.
To find out more, please visit my personal webpage.
