Nataša Dragović, assistant professor of mathematics at the University of St. Thomas College of Arts and Sciences, recently spoke with MIT Technology Review about her research, which applies probabilities to political elections, based on voter opinions and polarization.
From the story:
Growing up in Serbia, Nataša Dragović ’14 had no interest in politics. She also had no plans to become a mathematician like her parents. Yet today she’s an assistant professor of mathematics at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota, where her work applies probability to social science problems such as how opinions – including political opinions – change over time.
Among other topics, Dragović studies how American voters are influenced and whether techniques such as ranked-choice voting would lead to fairer outcomes that satisfy voters more than the current system. She’s also looking at modeling how political candidates alter their stances to win elections. “I’m working to see what happens if voters become polarized,” she says. “How does that affect the political candidate’s optimal strategy?”
