Nicholas C. Dias
Postdoctoral Fellow at Aarhus University
Education
2025 Ph.D. in Political Science and Communication, University of Pennsylvania
Dissertation: “The Underestimated Public: How Scholars Overlooked the Principles in Citizens’ Policy Opinions”
Advisors: Yphtach Lelkes and Matthew S. Levendusky.
2017 M.S. in Journalism, Columbia University
Master’s Project: “Companies, Countries Still Violating UN Shipping Sanctions Against North Korea.”
Concentration in computational and data journalism. Graduated with Honors.
2015 B.A. in Psychology and Communication, University of California, Davis
Honors Thesis: “Resolving Adult Attachment Theory and Relational Dialectics: Is the Need for Independence Always Present?”
Graduated with Highest Honors. Dean’s Honor List for 8 quarters. Phi Beta Kappa and Phi Kappa Phi.
Research Employment
2027– Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, Stony Brook University
2026–Present Visiting Researcher, Department of Political Science, Stony Brook University
2025–Present Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Political Science, Aarhus University
Co-authoring research with the PARTYOPINION project on how citizens use party cues to infer information about public policies.
2017–19 Researcher, Shorenstein Center on Media Politics and Public Policy, Harvard Kennedy School of Government
Led research undertaken by the Center’s anti-misinformation initiative, the Information Disorder (ID) Lab. Developed systems to monitor social media for misinformation. Organized training sessions for journalists on advanced fact-checking techniques and misinformation detection.
2017 First Draft News, Senior Research Fellow
Led research on social media bot activity during the 2017 UK General Election. Developed systems to monitor social media for misinformation. Led workshops for journalists on tracking misinformation on social media, verifying claims and images, and writing effective fact-checks. Wrote editorials and teaching resources.
Research
Peer-Reviewed
2026 Dias, N.C., Lucas, J., & Sheffer, L. “Beyond the Mean: How Thinking About The Distribution of Public Opinions Reduces Politicians’ Perceptual Errors.” Political Science Research and Methods. https://doi.org/10.1017/psrm.2025.10069.
2025 Dias, N.C., Druckman, J.N., & Levendusky, M.S. “Unraveling a ‘Cancel Culture’ Dynamic: When, Why, and Which Americans Sanction Offensive Speech.” The Journal of Politics. https://doi.org/10.1086/733004.
2024 Dias, N.C., Lelkes, Y., & Pearl, J. “American Partisans Vastly Underestimate the Diversity of Other Partisans’ Policy Attitudes.” Political Science Research and Methods. https://doi.org/10.1017/psrm.2024.36.
Dias, N.C., Aarslew, L.F., Frederiksen, K.V.F., Lelkes, Y., Pradella, L., & Westwood, S.J. “Correcting misperceptions of partisan opponents is not effective at treating democratic ills.” PNAS Nexus. https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgae304.
2022 Dias, N.C. & Lelkes, Y. “The Nature of Affective Polarization: Disentangling Policy Disagreement from Partisan Identity.” American Journal of Political Science. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12628.
2021 Holbert, R.L., Dias, N.C., Hardy, B.W., Jamieson, K.H., Levendusky, M.S., Renninger, A.S., Romer, D., Winneg, K.M., & Pasek, J. “Exploring the Role of Media Use Within an Integrated Behavioral Model (IBM) Approach to Vote Likelihood.” American Behavioral Scientist, 65(3), 412–431. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002764220975054.
2020 Dias, N.C. & Sippitt, A. “Researching Fact Checking: Present Limitations and Future Opportunities.” The Political Quarterly, 91(3), 605–613. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-923x.12892.
Dias, N.C., Pennycook, G. & Rand, D.G. “Emphasizing publishers does not effectively reduce susceptibility to misinformation on social media.” Harvard Kennedy School Misinformation Review. https://doi.org/10.37016/mr-2020-001.
Working Papers
Dias, N.C. “Don’t Judge Citizens for Changing Their Opinions” https://niccdias.github.io/assets/pdf/dias_stability_working.pdf.
Dias, N.C. “Do Inequalities in Factual Policy Knowledge Matter?” https://niccdias.github.io/assets/pdf/dias_know_working.pdf.
Dias, N.C. “Do Citizens’ Policy Opinions Match Their Principles?” https://niccdias.github.io/assets/pdf/dias_constraint_working.pdf.
Invited Talks
2026 “Don’t Judge Citizens for Changing Their Opinions.” Guest lecture at the University of Stuttgart.
“Do Inequalities in Factual Policy Knowledge Matter?” PARTISAN Research Workshop, University of Vienna.
2023 “Fair Judgments of Principled Preferences: How Distributive Justice Influences Citizens’ Policy Preferences.” Talk for the Aarhus University Political Behavior section.
“Why the Mass Public Values Each Other’s Policy Preferences.” Junior Americanist Workshop.
2022 “Are You Who I Think? Using Policy Preferences and Values to Judge Others.” Talk at the University of Massachusetts.
“Explicating and Reconsidering the Easy-Hard Issue Distinction in American Politics.” Talk at the University of Amsterdam.
2018 “WhatsApp, disinformation and political violence in Kenya and India.” Talk at George Washington University.
2017 “Hoaxes, memes & bots: Learning how to navigate our polluted information streams.” Talk at Mount Holyoke College.
“Verification and social media monitoring.” Talk at Facebook Colombia.
“Monitoring and mining Facebook and Twitter.” Talk at Universidad Santo Tomas, Bogota, Colombia.
Conference Presentations
2026 “Do Inequalities in Factual Policy Knowledge Matter?” American Political Science Association Annual Meeting.
“Do Inequalities in Factual Policy Knowledge Matter?” European Political Science Society Annual Conference.
“Do Inequalities in Factual Policy Knowledge Matter?” Midwest Political Science Association Annual Conference.
2025 “Are Principled Policy Opinions More Likely to Stick?” American Political Science Association Annual Meeting.
“Do Citizens Know Enough to Form Competent Policy Opinions?” Midwest Political Science Association Annual Conference.
2024 “Beyond the Mean: How Thinking About The Distribution of Public Opinions Reduces Politicians’ Perceptual Errors.” American Political Science Association Annual Meeting.
“Correcting the Illusion of Incompetence: ‘Just’ Preferences as a Fairer Standard of Citizen Competence.” Midwest Political Science Association Annual Conference.
“Distributive Justice Principles Broadly Structure the Mass Public’s Policy Preferences.” Midwest Political Science Association Annual Conference.
2023 “The Currency of Distributive Justice in Real-World Policy Discussions.” PPE Society Seventh Annual Meeting.
“American Partisans Vastly Underestimate the Diversity of Other Partisans’ Attitudes.” Nordic Workshop on Political Behavior.
“Americans Misperceive the Diversity, Not the Extremity, of Partisans’ Attitudes.” American Political Science Association Annual Meeting.
“Americans Misperceive the Diversity, Not the Extremity, of Partisans’ Attitudes.” Midwest Political Science Association Annual Conference.
2022 “Is it Really That Easy? Reconsidering ‘Easy’ and ‘Hard’ Issues in American Politics.” American Political Science Association Annual Meeting.
“Speech Norms in Contemporary America: The Realities and Misperceptions of ‘Cancel Culture’.” Aarhus ’22 Conference on Online Hostility and Bystanders.
“What Drives Cancel Culture?” American Political Science Association Annual Meeting.
“Is it Really that Easy? Reconsidering ‘Easy’ and ‘Hard’ Issues in American Politics.” Midwest Political Science Association Annual Conference.
2018 “Monitoring for health misinformation on Nigerian social networks.” Talk at Fake News that Harms conference in Abuja, Nigeria.
Op-Eds and Reports
2017 Dias, N.C. “How Academics Can Help Platforms Tackle Disinformation.” Understanding and Addressing the Disinformation Ecosystem, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA. https://bit.ly/3ziIFcU.
Dias, N.C. “The Era of WhatsApp Propaganda Is Upon Us.” Foreign Policy. https://foreignpolicy.com/2017/08/17/the-era-of-whatsapp-propaganda-is-upon-us.
Dias, N.C., Kamal, R. & Bastien, L. “What makes a good FOIA request? We studied 33,000 to find out.” Columbia Journalism Review. https://www.cjr.org/analysis/foia-request-how-to-study.php.
Awards & Funding
2025 Honorable Mention for Best Paper in Political Behavior. “Do Citizens’ Policy Opinions Match Their Goals? Applying a New Test of Vertical Constraint.” Midwest Political Science Association.
2024 Junior Fellowship. Institute for Humane Studies. $6,000.
2023 Publication Accelerator Grant. Institute for Humane Studies. $5,000.
2022 Penn Prize for Excellence in Teaching by Graduate Students. University of Pennsylvania.
2021 Distinguished Junior Scholar in Political Psychology. American Political Science Association.
2018 Baum, M. A. & Dias, N.C. “Understanding misinformation on mobile instant messengers: A study in Brazil, India, Myanmar, Nigeria, and Pakistan.” Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. $200,000.
Baum, M. A. & Dias, N.C. “Understanding misinformation on mobile instant messengers: A study in Brazil, India, Myanmar, Nigeria, and Pakistan.” Omidyar Network. $180,000.
Baum, M. A., Lazer, D., Grinberg, N., Swire-Thompson, B., Beauchamp, N., Dias, N.C. & Hickey, C. “Do Fact-Checks Slow the Spread of Misinformation on Facebook and Twitter?” Social Science One. $50,000.
Teaching
2025 Seminar Lecturer. Why Did Americans Vote for Trump? The Impact of American Institutions and Voter Psychology.
2021 Teaching Assistant. Introduction to American Politics. Lecturer Prof. Michele Margolis. University of Pennsylvania.
2020 Teaching Assistant. Introduction to Data Science. Lecturers Marc Trussler and Stephen Pettigrew. University of Pennsylvania.
Service to the Department
2025–Present Organizer, Political Behavior Workshop. Department of Political Science, Aarhus University.
2022–23 Representative, Graduate Student Organization. Department of Political Science, University of Pennsylvania.
2022–23 Graduate Student Representative, Professional Development Committee. Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania.
2021–22 Event Coordinator, Democracy and Information Group. Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania.
2020 President, Graduate Student Council. Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania.
2019–20 Treasurer, Graduate Student Council. Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania.
Service to the Discipline
Committees
2025–26 Member, Best Paper Award Committee, Elections, Public Opinion, and Voting Behavior Section, American Political Science Association.
2022 Member, Distinguished Junior Scholar Award Committee, Political Psychology Division, American Political Science Association.
Ad Hoc Reviewer
American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, British Journal of Political Science, Political Behavior, Electoral Studies, Journal of Experimental Political Science, Public Opinion Quarterly, Research & Politics, Harvard Kennedy School Misinformation Review, Time-Sharing Experiments for the Social Sciences, Nature Human Behaviour, Political Psychology, Journal of Quantitative Description: Digital Media, Political Communication, Political Science Research and Methods, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.