Students

Finding me

You can find my office, WDR 1112, on the map below depicting the first floor of the WHU-Duke Research Institute.

Office hours

What are office hours? I highly recommend Professor Andrew W. Ishak's (Santa Clara) answer in this funny little video. I love engaging with students and I certainly want to ensure that everyone's questions get answered. Like Ishak, I'm also a big proponent of multiplexity, which "exists when a tie between two or more people encompasses multiple activities or topics of conversation rather than a single activity or shared topic" (Mesch & Talmud, 2006). Multiplexity increases tie strength and trust, all good things. So please, come to office hours and, when you do, feel free to strike up a conversation about something not class-related.

Summer office hours are by appointment; email me. Fall office hours are daily: Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays from 14:30 to 15:00 and Fridays by appointment. If you need to meet remotely or you want to make a one-off appointment, please shoot me an email.

Signature Work mentorship

If you're a sophomore or first-semester junior thinking about Signature Work possibilities, I'm happy to help you bounce around ideas, explain the SW process, and detail my approach to SW mentorship. (If you're a first-year student, just chill.) The three key pieces of advice I dole out over and over again are these:

1. Publication: If you think you're going to publish your SW paper, you're almost certainly wrong. I don't have statistics on this, only anecdotal evidence. But in general, the gaps in quality and rigor between an undergraduate thesis and a scholarly publication are huge. The publication process is also quite arduous. That said, if your work is up to snuff, your SW mentor is a great resource for learning the ropes of publication. And I'm always willing to advise you on the process.

2. Graduate admissions: The SW timeline and the typical graduate admissions cycle don't coincide well. So don't expect to submit a polished SW paper as a writing sample for your graduate admissions applications. A lot of applications are due in the fall; your SW paper will either be unwritten or messy as hell until February or March. (Everybody says they can finish early, over the summer; nobody does.) If you want to leverage your SW project in the graduate admissions process, there's really only one option. Spend the spring of your junior year ironing out the details of research design with your mentor, spend the summer writing a formal pre-analysis plan, and post it online with a public registry like the OSF or the AEA RCT Registry. When graduate admissions committees see that you've pre-registered your SW research project, they'll see that you know research design, that you value transparency, and that you're not full of it.

3. Perfect fit: There are a lot of undergrads and not a heck of a lot of faculty. The odds are slim to none that you'll find a SW mentor who seems a perfect match. Maybe you'll be lucky enough to find a mentor whose substantive research interests align well. More likely, your best option will simply be someone in the right discipline. Beyond substantive interests, you should also consider methodological approach. If you want to do quantitative analyses, find a quant; if numbers scare you, find a qualitative researcher. Finally, ask senior SW mentees about the mentors you're considering. You'll ultimately spend a great deal of time with your SW mentor, so don't pick a jerk.

If you want to chat with my previous and current mentees to understand my style and expectations, here they are:

• Cao Kaixi (Serene) '22: "Do Pensions Promote Health Among the Elderly? Propensity Score Matching Evidence from China"

• Hailegiorgis, Kalkidan (Kali) '22: "Self Efficacy: The Role of Relative Power in Women's Political Participation"

• Wang Cingyi (Stella) '22: "Public Political Knowledge on the US's 'One-China' Policy"

• Fang Yichen (Ethan) '23: "Is China's Comprehensive Smoke-free Policy Effective? A Synthetic Difference-in-Differences Analysis in Beijing"

• Gao Yihan (Evelyn) '24: "A New Era of Family Planning: Surveying the Fertility Intentions of China's Generation Z"

• Hun, Jack Nyi '25: "Evaluating Kunshan's Metro Stations Using the Transit-Oriented Development Readiness Scale"

• Rutter, Simon '25: "Estimating the Impact of Chinese Outward FDI on Recipient Country Perceptions of Corruption"

Academic advising

To get the most out of your advisor, you really need to do two things. First, spend some time chatting with me. (See the discussion of multiplexity above.) Second, involve me in your decision-making process; don't just send me a filled-out form requesting my approval to, say, drop a course. Advising is an institutional arrangement engineered to supply you with advice and feedback, not signatures. So drop by my office or, even better, make an appointment via email.

Letters of recommendation

If you're applying for something that requires a letter of recommendation, I may be willing to write one for you. To request a letter of recommendation, please save us both time and read this first. 

Why study political science?

If you've ever wondered why on earth you should study political science, several esteemed political scientists have offered answers on YouTube: Vincent Hutchings (Michigan), Mike Munger (Duke), Zoe Oxley (Union College), Dave Rohde (Duke), John Sides (George Washington), Jim Stimson (UNC), and Sean Theriault (Texas).