Policy, Elections & Representation Lab
PEARL Group Photo (2022)

Policy, Elections & Representation Lab (PEARL)

At PEARL, we are interested in four big questions:

How do individuals make decisions about politics?

How do politicians make policy and represent citizens?

How is technology changing governance and politics? 

What are the political and social contexts and consequences of COVID-19?

Much of this work reflects our broader interests in politicians, citizens, and technology.

To answer these, we organize our research into four broad groups: voting behaviour and public opinion; political elites and representation; artificial intelligence, governance, and democracy; and COVID-19, politics, and society.

Our research is principally empirical, combining various forms of survey data with experiments (including field, lab, and survey experiments). We also use text-as-data, administrative records, and social media data.