#59: Belief Systems with Mark Brandt

Mark Brandt studies a bunch of things. He’s an assistant professor of psychology at Michigan State University. These days, he’s been exploring how we can think about belief systems as a network of interconnected opinions. Using mathematical simulations that specify how people’s opinions can be connected, Mark and his team have been able to establish a core model that explains a bunch of findings from political psychology.Mark also co-organizes a free online seminar, the Minority Politics Online Seminar Series (MPOSS). Check it out for a bunch of great presentations by researchers who are studying a range of important topics. A few things that come up in our conversation:We focus on a recent summary of the idea that networks can help explain belief systems (Brandt & Sleegers, 2021)Using network analysis, we can identify which opinions are central to a belief system (Brandt et al., 2019)It is difficult to quantify an individual person’s network of opinions (Brandt & Morgan, 2022; Brandt, 2022)For a transcript of this episode, visit: http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/episode/belief-systems-with-mark-brandt/Learn more about Opinion Science at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/ and follow @OpinionSciPod on Twitter.Join me over at Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/OpinionScienceLearn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.