Mohamed A. Hussein
Assistant Professor at Columbia. I study the psychology of persuasion, politics, and the intersection of the two. Ph.D. Stanford.
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein🚨Excited to announce the full-day Moral Psychology pre-conference at #SPSP2026! We sold out last year, and with this year’s incredible speaker lineup, we expect the same. Submit your poster or data blitz abstract by Oct. 23! spsp.wufoo.com/forms/2026-p... There’s a best poster award!
- Very astute piece by @anniekarni.bsky.social on how Democrats are embracing working-class candidates. My research lab has multiple ongoing projects on this very idea, so stay tuned for some empirical data coming soon! www.nytimes.com/2025/09/07/u... www.nytimes.com/2025/09/07/u...
- 🚨New Paper🚨 Elected officials are increasingly extreme. E.g., a recent analysis of 84,000 state-level candidates found that extreme candidates are now winning at the highest rates in 30 years. Why are people increasingly drawn to extreme candidates?
- Past work has focused on structural factors (e.g., primary elections, changes in supply of candidates). In a new paper, we shift the conversation to *psychological* factors. We test if the *identity relevance* of people’s attitudes cause them to choose extreme candidates.
- What is identity relevance? It’s the degree to which your view on an issue feels like a reflection of who you are. For some, views on climate change are core to identity. For others, they may have strong views, but those views don’t define them.
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View full threadThe paper is now out, and you can read it here: authors.elsevier.com/a/1lhYz51f8w... This is joint work with Zak Tormala and Christian Wheeler at Stanford.
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinLarge Language Models Do Not Simulate Human Psychology arxiv.org/pdf/2508.06950
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinThe annoying spam texts destroying the Democratic brand: $678M raised through those spam tactics $282M to one consulting firm: Mothership Strategies. $11M to actual campaigns (1.6%) The party isn’t just treating donors like marks—it’s being fleeced itself yet continues to back Mothership.
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein🚨Free data alert!! 🚨 Please share. Large new dataset of Amazon product reviews, including full text and photos and product characteristics, with individual *reviews labeled as fake reviews*. I believe this is the first publicly available data of this kind. github.com/bretthollenb...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinA big obstacle of studying fake reviews is that the ground truth is missing. Which review is fake and which is organic? Brett and coauthors provide a dataset that contains the ground truth for individual reviews using a novel method developed over several papers. A really valuable resource!
- 🚨Free data alert!! 🚨 Please share. Large new dataset of Amazon product reviews, including full text and photos and product characteristics, with individual *reviews labeled as fake reviews*. I believe this is the first publicly available data of this kind. github.com/bretthollenb...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinI am looking to recruit a postdoc to join my lab next fall, & work on 2 projects focused on online mobilization with social media datasets. If anyone knows of someone with computational skills (network analysis, NLP, etc.) who is looking for a postdoc- have them reach out to me.
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein🚨Preprint alert🚨 How does affective polarization change democracy? Lots of pubs study how AP affects trust, democratic norms, inter-partisan attitudes, and participation. We (w/ @polpsychjoe.bsky.social, @lilymasonphd.bsky.social) examine a vital assumption this research seems to rely on: 1/6🧵
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinIn TIME today, Jake Teeny and I share our take on AI-driven persuasion that uses your personal data to craft messages built just for you. time.com/7296719/ai-p...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein🚨 working paper (w. @morganlcj.bsky.social @markuswagner.bsky.social): Protesters are not judged equally - even if tactics of groups are similar. We ran an experiment in 🇩🇪 testing how people react to farmers vs. climate activists blocking roads. What we find is disturbing: osf.io/preprints/os...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinAt the CredibilityLab (currently hosting Aspredicted and Researchbox) we have a new platform in the works, AsCollected, that will help with this. We welcome input from experienced parties. Signup for alpha or beta testing or announcement of release at AsCollected.Org
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinA Tinder Test of Democratic Norms💋 New paper in @thejop.bsky.social with @bertous.bsky.social We rely on a visual conjoint experiment, cross-sectional data, & panel data to show that affective polarization drives the normalisation of the far right among the centre-right 🇬🇧🇪🇸 doi.org/10.1086/736698
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein🛎️New WP with @morganlcj.bsky.social @timallinger.bsky.social and @danbischof.bsky.social Against the surge of conjoints and other hypothetical experiments in relation to democratic backsliding, we study the consequences of using hypotheticals versus real-world scenarios. osf.io/preprints/os...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinEp 107! @mhusseinlab.bsky.social shares his research on the cues that signal open-mindedness and whether people like it when others listen to opposing political views. Apple: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/1... Spotify: open.spotify.com/episode/0B6L... Web: opinionsciencepodcast.com/episode/rece...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinA new and fresh paper calls for a fresh start on a new platform. Hi y'all! 👋 Check out my paper with @spillersas.bsky.social and @krajbichlab.bsky.social - we look at the multi-faceted role of attention in opportunity cost neglect, using eye-tracking + computational modeling. Read more at the link!
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein🚨🚨 I’m looking for a postdoctoral fellow to join my lab at Harvard's Psychology Department starting Fall 2025 🚨📣 Please share widely and spread the word to interested candidates! 🧵 🗓 Application review begins April 30 Apply here: rb.gy/k7q9kf (1/2)
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinIn a quasi-experimental survey with 59,508 participants across 63 countries, we tested 11 behavioral interventions designed to promote climate change mitigation. Our goal was to understand which interventions were most effective at encouraging climate-friendly behaviors—on a country-by-country basis
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinExcited to see this in print! It speaks to a number of social science literatures—protest effectiveness, repression, propaganda, stereotypes & morality, gender & politics, and disparate treatment between & within identity categories.
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein✨New preprint✨How does repeated exposure to transgressions online shape moral judgment? Results show two competing processes: 💠We get desensitized = ⬇️ wrong 💠Transgression seems more infamous =⬆️wrong Relative strength of each may predict outrage to viral transgressions w/ @danieleffron.bsky.social
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein🚨NEW PAPER ALERT🚨 A field experiment w/ 13M federal student loan borrowers at risk of delinquency shows we can meaningfully reduce delinquencies with well-designed reminders. Work led by Rob Kuan (of Wharton). Read paper in @pnas.org: www.pnas.org/doi/epub/10.... What reminder ingredients matter?🧵
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein(1/4) Our new JEP:G paper dives into how moral values and misinformation spread on social media: media.mola-lab.org/file/1737039...
- Check out this exciting new paper on receptivity to AI!
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Husseinwhat counts as breaking a rule? you might think this q is easy, but people actually integrate signals from morality, legality, punishability, and normativity to figure it out, new preprint w/ @jowylie.bsky.social & dries bostyn osf.io/preprints/ps... #psychscisky #cognition #socpsyc #philsky
- Check out this very exciting paper!
- New work out in JEP:Gen with @erikakirgios.bsky.social and Edward Chang! How do historically marginalized job applicants respond to concrete, quantified diversity commitments in job ads? We conducted a large, preregistered field experiment to find out…
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinNew paper on informed consent! I’m so proud of this work led by @rachelschlund.bsky.social. We show that regardless of how clueless WE feel about the terms we agree to when signing a contract or clicking accept, others assume we knew what we were getting into. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
- This is super exciting! JCR will now be accepting Registered Reports and Commentaries!
- Exciting developments at JCR! As of January 1st, JCR will consider two additional formats, registered reports and brief commentaries. Details here: consumerresearcher.com/more-options...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein"[Consumption vocabulary] helps you understand details and identify what *you* like." Of course @dieworkwear.bsky.social is right - and there's science behind it! My favorite paper on quilts (West, Brown, & Hoch, 1996, JCR): People who developed a quilt vocabulary had more-consistent preferences.
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinJust published on APSR First View: "The Vietnam Draft Lottery and Whites’ Racial Attitudes: Evidence from the General Social Survey" by Donald Green and Oliver Hyman-Metzger. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinNot every study needs to have a power analysis, but every study needs a sample size justification. I discuss 6 approaches, and 6 ways to think about which effect sizes are of interest in the study you are planning. online.ucpress.edu/collabra/art...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinWe're excited to announce the new team of AEs and ERB members at JCR starting in January of 2025. Thank you to the current team for everything you've done for the journal and thank you to the new team for signing on! consumerresearcher.com/2025-associa...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinCan we reduce polarization with empathy? Just published a new (replication) study with @mrooduijn.bsky.social and Matthijs Gillissen showing that different components of empathy have quite different effects [1/5] www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinAnd the very incomplete part 2: go.bsky.app/43FXWwj If you aren’t part of either and you are political psychology or adjacent let me know and I’ll addat://did:plc:eoedukv7uvfieg5edl6jvg6r/app.bsky.graph.starterpack/3l47l5txhuj2j
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein🚨New Preprint🚨 *Moral Stereotyping in Large Language Models* We show that LLMs are inaccurate in estimating the moral values of diverse cultures: LLMs stereotype cultures in predictable ways. Led by my star Ph.D. student, Aliah Zewail osf.io/preprints/ps...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinThis is a very good and important paper for scholars of race and identity. Also just one of those papers you read that makes you wonder how this wasn’t done much sooner. Highly recommend it.
- How do consumers react to political ads that meddle in the primaries of the other party? Dems and Reps spent $53M+ on ads helping extreme members of the other party in primaries. Their goal? To boost their own chances in the general election by helping candidates who might are easier to defeat.
- As more information becomes available about this strategy, we ask: How do consumers react to the use of "meddle ads"? Consumers might tolerate meddle ads because of polarization and wanting to keep the out-party out of power. Consumers might be averse to meddle ads. It is underhanded and risky.
- We consistently find that consumers (N = 7,740) are *averse* to the use of meddle ads--even from candidates from their own party. Consumers donated smaller amounts to, reported more negative attitudes towards, and spoke more negatively about candidates who used meddle ads.
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View full threadHere's a summary of the article: business.columbia.edu/insights/bus...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. Hussein
- A friendly reminder: The deadline for this postdoc application is this Monday, December 16th. Please apply to work with @nourkteily.bsky.social and me at the #CenterForEnlightenedDisagreement!
- I've created a Starter Pack for academics in Behavioral Marketing. Feel free to nominate anyone whom I might have missed. go.bsky.app/8mGBELg
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinA great new starter pack spearheaded by @mhusseinlab.bsky.social! go.bsky.app/SrL8hraat://did:plc:azmloy5bd2cxvaxak2bucw6e/app.bsky.graph.starterpack/3lcviwing4o25
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinNew lab paper! In a registered report, Jesse Reid and I looked at the relationship between right-wing authoritarianism (RWA), social dominance orientation (SDO), and implicit/explict attitudes in a large sample of participants from @projectimplicit.bsky.social. online.ucpress.edu/collabra/art...
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinPsychological inoculation against misinformation does not appear to transfer to real posts or synthetic posts using other misinformation techniques osf.io/preprints/ps... #polisky #polpsych #socpsych #misinformation
- Reposted by Mohamed A. HusseinJust published on APSR First View: "Gendered Perceptions and the Costs of Political Toxicity: Experimental Evidence from Politicians and Citizens in Four Democracies" by Gregory Eady and Anne Rasmussen. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
