Research

Research Agenda

“Research is to see what everybody else has seen, and to think what nobody else has thought.”

Albert Szent-Gyorgyi (1893-1986)

 

My research agenda focuses on developing a better understanding of the public policy process. Much of my research has addressed how and why governments regulate private, public, and social issues, and I am particularly interested in exploring the behavior of governments when there are intersections of morality, public health, environmental, gendered, cultural, and economic interests. This approach often necessitates examination of myriad factors including interest group activity, media coverage, and public perception of policy issues. Because my research agenda focuses on the policy process, I am able to apply my approach to a variety of policy issue areas. While some may see this approach as unfocused, I believe it allows me to further develop our scholarly understanding of policy theory, highlighting different contexts in which policy theories are confirmed or challenged.

While my research is sometimes diverse, my substantive interests tend to center on women’s health, gender politics, and environmental policy. There has been little exploration of the dynamic between economics and morality when it comes to issues that involve personal, and sometimes contentious, issues such as the use of assisted reproductive technologies (ART) to become a parent, the parental decision to vaccinate children against sexually transmitted infections, or personal health care decisions. These same dynamics often play out in environmental politics, especially when there are public health and economic concerns. My research agenda seeks to further develop our current understanding of how economic interests, scientific knowledge, public health concerns, and public opinion influence the politics surrounding and the policy approaches toward these deeply personal and often contentious issues. 

While my research tends to engage a variety of policy theories, I have recently taken a special interest in the Narrative Policy Framework (NPF). Specifically, I am interested in developing more nuanced understandings of the micro level, the level that seeks to explain individual use and uptake of narratives. To reach this goal, my co-authors and I have taken on several projects that analyze how individuals identify narrators and how stakeholders strategically choose which narratives to present to the public, respectively. Recent projects have drawn upon theories developed outside of political science, and I have worked to incorporate them into our understanding of individual behavior within the NPF.

One of my next projects is building upon a recently published manuscript that utilizes the Third-Person Effect (TPE), developed by communications scholars, to explain why narrators would abandon their preferred narratives in favor of a narrative that they believe will be more palatable to the public. TPE contends that individuals perceive they will be impacted by media messages differently than others will be. Using this theoretical framework, we find that stakeholders that perceive themselves as more distant from the public are more likely to abandon their preferred narratives. Taking this finding a step further, I hypothesize that there is a gendered component to this correlation based on a theory developed in the field of psychology, the Imposter Syndrome (IS). Imposter Syndrome theory contends that many high achieving individuals, and especially well-educated women, tend to doubt their intelligence and achievements, feeling like imposters in their positions. I am currently exploring how Imposter Syndrome and Third-Person Effect interplay to influence public narrative selection.

I am also interested in the concept of public narratives, which are defined as narratives that are ever-present in society. Examples of public narratives include the narrative of womanhood (what it means to be a woman in society), the narrative of motherhood, the narrative of family, and the narratives of feminism and women’s rights. These public narratives define what is possible and what is impossible, they define what is accepted and unaccepted. The NPF contends that narrator trust is a factor in whether the public accepts or believes a narrative. Who are the narrators of public narratives, and in the absence of a defined narrator do individuals identify their own narrators? Does this result in fractured narratives, and what does this do to the influence of the narrative on public policy outcomes? Are new narrators able to be introduced to try to recapture a narrative? Each of these questions are leading me to new areas of exploration in my research, which will help to fill in missing and important aspects of the theories of the policy process. This line of research has resulted in one book chapter in The Hollywood Connection, which looks at how the public has identified their own narrators of feminism and the role that plays in how they perceive feminism.  

Most recently, several colleagues and I have begun to pursue a line of research that examines policies that require federally funded hospitals to provide qualified medical interpreters to patients with limited English proficiency. Unfortunately, our preliminary research has revealed that approximately 56 percent of hospitals fail to meet this standard which creates substantial healthcare barriers for vulnerable populations. Currently, we are working on a project that views this policy issue through the lens of Social Construction of Target Populations theory. Our preliminary research has also revealed a lack of cultural competence in the provision of care to minority populations in Southeast Idaho, including Indigenous peoples. We have begun to explore how the availability of qualified medical interpreters and training in cultural competence can improve the provision of quality healthcare. We are in the process of seeking grant funding to conduct a larger-scale examination of this important public health issue.

One hallmark of my research, as evidenced by my publications and works in progress, is incorporation of students in my research process. I have co-authored numerous projects with students, and I enjoy mentoring students through this experience. My approach is more than having students participate in my research, but I work to incorporate students into every aspect of the research project from conception to publication. This approach has taken my research in new directions and has been very rewarding.

Featured Publication

This project explores the concept of public narratives, which are defined as narratives that are ever-present in society. Examples of public narratives include the narrative of womanhood (what it means to be a woman in society), the narrative of motherhood, the narrative of family, and the narratives of feminism and women’s rights. These public narratives define what is possible and what is impossible, they define what is accepted and unaccepted.

The Narrative Policy Framework contends that narrator trust is a factor in whether the public accepts or believes a narrative. Who are the narrators of public narratives, and in the absence of a defined narrator do individuals identify their own narrators? Does this result in fractured narratives, and what does this do to the influence of the narrative on public policy outcomes? Are new narrators able to be introduced to try to recapture a narrative? Each of these questions are leading me to new areas of exploration in my research, which will help to fill in missing and important aspects of the theories of the policy process.

This line of research has resulted in one book chapter in The Hollywood Connection, which looks at how the public has identified their own narrators of feminism and the role that plays in how they perceive feminism. Specifically, this chapter explores how individuals often assign celebrity narrators to feminism and the women’s movement, and how these self-assigned narrators impact support for these movements.

The Hollywood Connection: The Influence of Fictional Media and Celebrity Politics on American Public Opinion, edited by Heather E. Yates and Timothy G. Hill was published 2018.

This image is the book cover for The Hollywood Connection: The Influence of Fictional Media and Celebrity Politics on American Public Opinion.

This image is the book cover for The Hollywood Connection: The Influence of Fictional Media and Celebrity Politics on American Public Opinion.

This image is the cover page of our 2018 publication in Policy Studies Journal.

This image is the cover page of our 2018 publication in Policy Studies Journal.

Publications