Jessica Gottlieb

Compares two online interventions aimed at reducing partisan animosity: one based on cross-partisan contact and another focused on within-group skill-building. Results show that the within-group intervention is more effective at reducing partisan hostility, suggesting that Americans can become less polarized without needing direct contact with opposing party members.

Examines reciprocal group reflection, a method for reducing political polarization. Finds that those who participated in the workshops showed reduced polarization, greater empathy for opposing views, and increased support for depolarization efforts.

Reviews a range of experimental studies on strategies to fight misinformation across both the Global North and South. Finds that the most consistently effective approaches are informational ones: inoculation/prebunking and debunking.

Argues that, particularly in weak-state democracies, economic informality constrains the rise of programmatic politics. Evidence from surveys and experiments in Senegal and two other African countries shows that informality inhibits the formation of a constituency for programmatic politics.

Explores how the cultural practice of matrilineality–tracing kinship through the female line–helps close the gender gap in political participation across Africa. Demonstrates that matrilineality's success in improving outcomes for women lies in its ability to sustain more progressive norms about the role of women in society.

Examines how political competition affects public goods provision, particularly in young democracies. Finds that greater political competition is linked to worse public goods outcomes due to legislative bargaining inefficiencies.

Explores how political brokers influence voter behavior in clientelistic democracies, focusing on Senegal. Argues that brokers use distinct strategies—persuasion, reciprocation, and punishment—to motivate voters as a function of their local institutional context.

Investigates how shared social identity influences political decision-making, using a field experiment during Benin’s 2015 legislative elections. Results are consistent with a theory of motivated reasoning whereby voters act on new information only when it allows them to reaffirm their social identity.

Examines how raising citizens’ expectations of their government affects political accountability, arguing that when people underestimate what their government can and should do, they’re less likely to punish underperforming politicians.