Biography

I am an interdisciplinary social scientist, currently based at the School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University in the Center for Policy Research on Energy and the Environment (C-PREE). I work with various centers, schools and institutes at Princeton, including the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, the School of Public and International Affairs, and the High Meadows Environmental Institute.

My research sits at the intersection of behavioral economics, decision-making and psychology, political ecology and social and environmental policy. I work with cross-disciplinary teams to better understand how individuals embedded in social-ecological systems respond to changes in their environments, and how we can build community resilience to social and environmental shocks. In this work, I am especially interested in understanding the dynamics between individuals and their social spheres. One line of research looks at the interaction between top-down and bottom-up forms of governance, and how and when social norms lead to social tipping dynamics.

In parallel work, I study the political economy of cash transfer programs and pilots, with a focus on shifting public attitudes towards cash assistance.

I hold a B.A. in psychology, economics and literature from McGill University (2006), an M.Sc. in economics from University College London (2009) and a Ph.D. in cognitive science from New York University (2016), where I worked in the Institute for the Study of Decision-Making. My Ph.D. research focused on understanding how individuals make economic and resource use decisions in dynamic environments.

In parallel to my academic work, I have worked as an editor at Nature Human Behavior and as a consultant, research fellow and data analyst on projects with various institutions, including the Economist, the Economist Intelligence Unit, the World Bank, the Institute for Fiscal Studies, and the Jain Family Institute.

I have taught courses on social science and the environment, behavioral economics, risk management, negotiation and conflict resolution, psychology and computational and mathematical methods at New York University, Columbia University, and Princeton University.