Taubman Center for American Politics and Policy

Suhyen Bae is a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Taubman Center for Public Opinion at the Watson School for International & Public Affairs. She received her PhD in Political Science from Duke University. Her research explores how social connections impact political attitudes and behavior in American and comparative contexts, bridging literature from social networks, psychology, and public health. Her current book project, The Political Consequences of Loneliness, demonstrates how loneliness fosters political discontent and shapes patterns of participation and susceptibility to misinformation. Another facet of her research investigates the interplay between affective and cognitive elements in voting behavior. In The Fundamental Voter (Oxford University Press, 2024), she and her coauthors identify five fundamental factors that structure the American electorate by broadening the partisan cleavage and intensifying polarization. Building on this work, she is also investigating the policy basis of affective polarization and candidate evaluations. Her work has been supported by the APSA Dissertation Development Grant.