Application Information

For Students 

2024 SSSRP projects appear below. Interested student applicants can apply on Workday starting February 27, 2024.

Examining the Distinctiveness of Letter Shapes
Yoolim Kim, Psychology/Cognitive & Linguistic Sciences

In this project, we will work with Glyph, an online browser-based applet designed to investigate the letter shapes of the world's writing systems. Through citizen science and online crowdsourcing, we invite users to sort characters into groups according to a rule of their choosing, e.g., ‘All characters with an enclosed space’. With currently more than 60,000 rules generated from users worldwide, our goal is to work towards a visual morphology of letter shapes that is both computationally sound and grounded in large-scale empirical data representative of the general population. Our aim is to explore how humans are able to create a potentially infinite number of symbols from a finite set of constituent shapes, all while abiding by a number of key cognitive constraints. In the same way that linguists have developed robust theories and models to understand how a language’s sound system maximizes phonological space, Glyph aims to answer the same set of questions but about written characters. To what extent do scripts maximize the space of possible shapes? And to what extent are individual scripts optimized, and how do such systems negotiate often-competing cognitive constraints of distinctiveness and efficiency? Students will assist in the collaborative thinking of how to make use of current data, particularly in terms of analyzing, modelling and theorizing.

 

Culture, Stress and Well-being
Stephen Chen, Psychology

Applicants should indicate their interest and qualifications for Project A, Project B, or both.

Project A : The Chinese American Family Experiences (CAFE) Study
The CAFE Study examines Chinese American parents' and adolescents' experiences with race and social mobility. We're currently recruiting students who are literate and/or fluent in Chinese (Mandarin or Cantonese) to help recruit participants, conduct interviews with parents and adolescents, and process and analyze data.

Project B: Asian American Religion, Spirituality, and Family Development
This project examines the role of religion and spirituality in Asian American mental health and family relationships. Students will ideally have contacts and/or experience working with different Asian American religious-spiritual communities. Work on this project will include literature reviews, participant recruitment, and data analysis.

 

Who Trusts? The Relevance of Race for Political Trust
Jenn Chudy, Political Science

Understanding group differences in political trust can shed light on democratic health in multiracial polities. Intriguingly, some research reports that people of color log equivalent levels of political trust to white Americans despite vastly different experiences with the government. This summer, my co-author and I will launch a survey experiment to examine whether the country's three largest racial groups (white, Black, and Latino) think about political trust in distinct ways. We are especially interested in investigating whether their lack of trust is better characterized as mistrust or distrust. Economist Trevon Logan suggests the former is "by definition, ...an irrationality, as the lack of trust is based on intuition. Distrust, on the other hand, is lack of trust based on experience" (2022 93).

 

Digital Wellbeing and Action Programming
Linda Charmaraman, WCW/Education

The summer intern for the Youth, Media, and Wellbeing Research Lab at the Wellesley Centers for Women (youthmediawellbeing.org) would have the opportunity to work on multiple ongoing research projects, assisting with research literature reviews, coding & analyzing data from survey and/or qualitative datasets related to social media use, psychosocial and behavioral health, human-animal interactions, and digital citizenship across the lifespan. This may entail writing and copyediting reports, piloting surveys, conducting interviews or focus groups, and using NVivo to code qualitative data. In our applied research and action work this summer, we will be organizing digital wellbeing workshops: 1) in-person daylong workshops for students and families and 2) a weeklong virtual workshop on designing positive social media spaces with approximately 25 middle school students from across the country. Collaborating with our teen Youth Advisory Board to shape the curriculum, the intern will co-facilitate the workshops and mentor middle school students along with a team of Wellesley College student facilitators. After the workshop, the intern will analyze the evaluation surveys and organize the Zoom transcript data. Throughout the summer, the intern will work with the WCW Communications team to help co-manage the lab’s Instagram account and external newsletter. In addition, the intern would be invited to attend a weekly writing group at WCW, potentially developing a blog or infographics to highlight research lab findings.
 

Racial, Immigration and Linguistic Justice for Recently Arrived Youth
Pamela D'Andrea Martinez, Education

My research theorizes educational belonging for immigrant youth of color, particularly those recently arrived in the U.S. as teenagers: a group whose presence in the U.S. is highly contested and for whom social justice efforts in schools are often decided without their perspectives. I am seeking a research assistant to support ongoing and new critical ethnographic and collaborative research that utilizes immigrant youth voice to challenge the bewilderment of schools over how to serve them.
Fellows working on this project will support two areas: (1) writing projects related to the research (2) local relationship-building with immigration and racial justice youth organizing groups, educators, schools, and organizations. Tasks associated with these areas include: tracking issues related to immigrant youth and families, both current and historical in New York and New England; conducting reviews of existing scholarship; building connections to local actors and youth; ethnographic fieldwork.

 

Family-Centered Perspectives on Child Study
Soo Hong, Education

This summer, I am preparing the launch of a new research study that explores the role and perspectives of parents and caretakers in the study of children. Child study - also called the descriptive review of the child - is a research process that engages educators in careful, thoughtful, and deliberate observation of children to see them holistically and learn how to support their learning in schools. It is a process that rarely includes the observations and perspectives of parents. In preparation for a project that brings teachers and parents/caretakers to engage in collaborative child study projects to better understand and support students, this student research assistant will: 1) develop a review of relevant literature 2) support the early development of the research plan gleaned through conversations with researchers, teachers, and parents, and 3) transcribe and code interview data.

 

 

How has the Home Affordability Crisis Evolved in the Past Few Years?
Kyung Park, Economics

In recent years, home prices have accelerated to the point that the current housing market is often described as one with a ``home affordability crisis.” Individuals and households are increasingly priced out of the market, or purchase lower quality homes (e.g. smaller square footage, greater distance from work and amenities) than they could have just a few years ago. This raises concerns as to whether homes are allocated efficiently and equitably across members of society. The student will work with myself and Eni Mustafaraj (Department of Computer Science) to analyze data collected from an online real estate broker to gain insight on the local housing market.

 

Tracking the Consequences of the Implementation of the Inflation Reducation Act for the North American Clean Energy Supply Chain
Jay Turner, Environmental Studies

Addressing climate change requires scaling up the deployment of clean energy technologies.  Recent US policy initiatives have focused on encouraging investment in domestic manufacturing of wind, solar, advanced batteries, electric vehicles, and other technologies important to a clean energy transition.  This project continues work that Professor Turner and Wellesley students have been involved in for the past two years, tracking investments in the clean energy supply chain and considering consequences related to environmental sustainability and environmental justice. Students will gain skills related to interdisciplinary research, data analysis, data presentation, and investments in clean energy industries.  Students with an interest in energy policy and clean energy technologies are encouraged to apply.  Students with interest in or knowledge of data visualization tools, such as Tableau, are encouraged to apply.

 

Social History of Anti-Carceral/Abololition Feminist Organizing in Greater Boston
Laura Grattan, Political Science

This project will document the social history and ongoing work of anti-carceral and abolition feminist organizing in the Greater Boston region. Community activists in the region have long led efforts to reimagine freedom, justice, safety, and education beyond the prison. They have worked tirelessly to advance public understanding of the links between racial inequity, gender injustice, criminalized survival, and carceral punishment. And they have developed cutting-edge approaches to supporting individuals and promoting community wellness in the aftermath of incarceration. The project has multiple dimensions and products: 1) an online, interactive “abolition syllabus” documenting the stories, relationships, networks, knowledge, strategies, and visions of key activists and organizations in region; 2) a landscape analysis to understand how scholars and activists have built/ are building relationships, practices, and spaces of co-learning that are accountable to communities whose horizon is a world beyond the prison. Student researchers may support the project in a number of ways: conducting literature reviews; drafting memos that summarize available information on regional activists and organizations; drafting website content; identifying and analyzing past and ongoing scholarly/activist collaborations; transcribing webinars and recorded testimony from state and local government hearings; and attending local organizing efforts and/or conversations with community partners to take notes (to the extent that this is possible).

 

Covid-19 and Health Disparities in (preferably) a Southern US Community
Anastasia Karakasidou, Anthropology

The research will investigate the impact of Covid-19 in the community and how it affected the various ethnic, racial and socio-economic groups. What kind of access to health care and vaccination did they have. How did they comply to state and government directives. What was the role of religion in the pandemic experience?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Past projects from Summer 2023:

The Political Lives of African First Ladies
Chipo Dendere, Africana Studies

Project overview: There has been very little academic work on the women behind the power in African governments beyond focusing on their fashion choices and corruption. I will argue in the book that some of the First Ladies have been very influential in policy making. I will study six first ladies, Grace Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Sarah Kyoloba Amin of Uganda, Bobi Ladawa Mobutu of Zaire, now DRC, Leïla Ben Ali of Tunisia, Maryam Abacha of Nigeria, and Simone Gbagbo of Ivory Coast. The actual list might change once I start doing work.

Experience with social science research is a plus. If students speak French that will be good as well.

 

Parenthood Postponed: Using the ARTS for Family-Building
Rosanna Hertz/ WGST
 

Making babies has become not only an achievement but an enterprise. The pursuit of parenthood has become more complicated and stratified, especially as people delay children. First births today are occurring at increasingly older ages for women, especially for those who have advanced education, in almost all North American and European countries. This is an empirically based study that is US/Canada based for a book project. The study includes people who conceived with assisted reproductive technologies and those who tried but did not succeed.

1. Familiarity with Atalis (a coding program) and having taken a methods/qualitative course preferably in WGST or SOC.
2. Having taken a family course or a course on reproduction.
 

Post-Policy System Evolution/Green Port Governance
Beth DeSombre, Environmental Studies

 

Project 1: Post-policy system evolution – book project that examines how environmental regulation, once adopted, sets up systemic changes that frequently make policies easier and cheaper to implement than initially predicted. General social science background necessary (economics and political science especially, helpful along knowledge of environmental issues); student will gain data searching and analysis skills, along with working on reviews of the relevant academic literature and working to identify and gather information on case studies.

Project 2: Green Port governance --This study examines environmental governance measures adopted or enforced by the busiest 200+ ports around the world. Student will help search for missing data (most is already collected) and work on literature reviews to support/frame analysis.

For both: Social science background (please specify courses taken) attention to detail, and research experience useful.

 

Imagining War: The Burning of the Kuwaiti Oil Fields
Britain Hopkins, Sociology
 

This project considers the geopolitics of war, oil, and ecological devastation through an examination of cultural representations of the burning of the Kuwaiti oil fields during the First Gulf War (1990-1991). The ecological toll of the war included the explosion of over nine-hundred oil wells, hundreds of which caught fire and dozens of which gushed oil to form extensive lakes. Additionally, over ten-million barrels worth of crude oil were released into the Persian Gulf, constituting the largest maritime oil release in history. In total, an estimated one billion barrels worth of crude oil were released into the environment during the war and in its aftermath. This project seeks to provoke memories and recognition of the event by asking how it was documented, depicted, and made sense of as it transpired. The student fellow will assist with three areas of the project’s development, contributing to a journal-length article on the topic. First, the student fellow will assist in the assembly and analysis of an archive of visual media depictions of the event. Second, the fellow will help compile an overview of the environmental footprint of the U.S. military, 1945 through present. Third, the fellow will read texts within the field of critical and feminist geopolitics which will help form the conceptual and historical framework of the project. Skills gained include experience compiling and analyzing archival sources, experience conducting visual and media analysis, and in-depth familiarity with the First Gulf War and field of critical/feminist geopolitics.

Interest in geopolitics (SOC 223 recommended), cultural theory, visual and media analysis, war and environment.

 

Long Covid: Science and human experience
Anastasia Karakasidou, Anthropology
 

Long Covid is still a puzzle for the medical community as is a burden for those who still suffer from it. Although the pandemic is considered to be at its tail end, there are still individuals who suffer from the long effects of the virus. This summer, I would like to work with a student who will research both the science and the human experience of long Covid. How much we do know about the ailment? Are there any medical treatments available? How do individuals cope given the uncertainty and ambiguity of the long disease? What are the symptoms? How are sufferers coping with them? How do families accommodate the needs of sufferers? What differences do we find along the lines of gender, race and socio-economic standing? These are only a few of the questions that my summer research would like to answer.

The student must have some background in anthropology and/or studies of epidemics and pandemics.

 

Project Title: (Re)Presenting Asian American Women in Diaspora (2 parts)
Andi Remoquillo, American Studies
 

The student fellow will work on two separate projects focusing on Asian American women in diaspora. In both projects, the student will help locate scholarly sources, put together literature reviews, conduct content/media analyses, transcribe interviews, and create bibliographies.

1. A book project that draws from ethnography and social histories to piece together a missing narrative of Filipina American women in mid-century Chicago and how they shaped the trajectory of the Fil-Am community today.

2.  An article that draws from data collected through (auto)ethnographic and content/media research to explore the ways in which Asian American women's conversations, relationships, and experiences with their mothers growing up impacted their current understanding of gendered racial identities and family structures. This project seeks to challenge previous research that emphasizes a strained intergenerational relationship between immigrant parents and American-born children by illustrating the ways that mother-daughter relationships can also function as protective and resistive spaces against heteropatriarchal violence and White supremacist institutions.

The student should have taken at least one Asian American Studies, American Studies, Women's and Gender Studies, or Ethnic Studies course; be familiar with intersectionality in reading and writing; have some basic understanding of qualitative research (does not need to be in depth); an ability to read and write in an analytical manner.

 

Digital Wellbeing and Social Media Innovation
Linda Charmaraman, WCW/EDUC
 

The summer intern for the Youth, Media, and Wellbeing Research Lab at the Wellesley Centers for Women (youthmediawellbeing.org) would have the opportunity to work on multiple ongoing projects, assisting with research literature reviews, coding & analyzing data from survey and/or qualitative datasets related to social media use, psychosocial and behavioral health, and digital citizenship across the lifespan. This may entail writing and copyediting reports, piloting surveys, conducting interviews or focus groups, and using NVivo to code qualitative data. In our applied research work this summer, we will be conducting a weeklong virtual workshop on designing positive social media spaces with approximately 25 middle school students from across the country. Collaborating with our teen Youth Advisory Board to shape the curriculum, the intern will co-facilitate the virtual workshop and mentor middle school students along with a team of Wellesley College student facilitators during the weeklong workshop in July. After the workshop, the intern will analyze the evaluation surveys and organize the Zoom transcript data. Throughout the summer, the intern will work with the WCW Communications team to help co-manage the lab’s Instagram account and external newsletter. In addition, the intern would be invited to attend a weekly writing group at WCW, potentially developing a blog or infographics to highlight research lab findings.

Ability to work both collaboratively and independently this summer is critical. We will work together on an interdisciplinary team (CS, Psych, MAS, data science) to figure out the best 3-4 days to meet in person at Cheever House (15-minute walk from campus or escort ride available) and when we would meet remotely. The following are helpful to mention when applying: a) interest in recruiting and mentoring middle school students for our virtual workshop dedicated to digital wellbeing, b) creative strategies to engage enthusiastically with teens over Zoom, c) experience/coursework in human-computer interactions, adolescent development, or media studies, and/or d) analyzing quantitative or qualitative data. Preference given to students who have either taken EDUC 328 or have experience with the Youth, Media, & Wellbeing research lab as a research assistant or volunteer.

 

The Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations: Understanding Political Fatalism among White Democrats
Jennifer Chudy, Political Science
 

What assumptions do voters make about other voters’ racial attitudes? There are some white Democrats who worry that being actively attentive to issues of race and justice will turn off a sizable portion of their party. Implicit in their diagnoses is the expectation that large segments of their party object to these conversations, despite evidence that most white people with racially resentful views sifted out of the Democratic party in recent years (Engelhardt 2021; Jardina and Ollerenshaw 2022; Sides, Tesler, and Vavreck 2019), thus leaving the Democratic Party with a coalition of racially sympathetic white Americans and people of color (Sides, Tausanovitch, and Vavreck 2022). The topic, then, has the potential to motivate broad participation within the party, yet “identity politics” are still often characterized as a third rail. To be sure, Republicans may become mobilized in opposition, but I am more curious about the assumption that Democrats will be too. This project will explore the historical and psychological dimensions of this political fatalism. Historically, I want to identify other moments in American history where elites have underestimated voters’ preferences for racial progressivism. I am also interested in unpacking the psychological motivations undergirding these assumptions. In particular, I want to investigate whether assigning the blame on racist others provides a convenient scapegoat, allowing some Democrats shelter to promote a preferred political outcome without explicitly taking ownership of it.

Required: some coursework in American politics OR social psychology. Preferred: Completion of a statistics course, preferably POL 299 or ECON 203, and/or experience web scraping (specifically Twitter).
 

Culture, Stress, and Well-Being
Stephen Chen, Psychology
 

Project A: The Chinese American Family Experiences (CAFE) Study

Our lab is currently examining Chinese American parents' and adolescents' experiences with race and social mobility. We're currently recruiting students who are literate and/or fluent in Chinese (Mandarin or Cantonese) to help recruit participants, conduct interviews with parents and adolescents, and process and analyze data.

Project B: (Tentative - pending collaborator availability)

The lab may also have a research opportunity for students who: (1) have experience conducting advanced statistical analyses (e.g., linear and logistic regressions, moderation and mediation analyses) with large, nationally-representative datasets; and (2) are interested in the intersections between psychosocial stressors and health outcomes.

Project A: Fluency in Chinese (Mandarin or Cantonese). Project B: Advanced statistical analyses skills with large datasets]

 

 

For Faculty

The faculty application period will open in February, 2024.

The SSSRP at Wellesley College offers students a unique opportunity to conduct research in a
variety of social science fields, broadly defined, under the supervision of a Wellesley faculty
mentor selected to participate. The program also offers faculty members the chance to work
with a student whose time and work during the fellowship period is expressly dedicated to
supporting and advancing the faculty member's research.

Program Dates:  8.5 Week Research program: May 30 – July 26, 2024
Summer Research Poster Session: Thursday, July 25, 2024 (all students are expected to
participate in the poster session)

Program Features:
● Weekly seminars for student and faculty participants to present their work
● Opportunities for SSSRP fellows to connect with other Wellesley College students and
faculty, for instance through attending weekly seminars, and participating in other
workshops and activities throughout the summer program
● Poster presentation at end of program