Department of Government

Jonathan Ladd studies American politics, with a focus on the news media and public opinion. His book manuscript, Why Americans Hate the News Media and Why it Matters, is under contract at Princeton University Press. It examines the causes and consequences of declining public trust in the institutional news media over the past 40 years. It argues that party polarization and the nature of the news industry both indirectly shape how citizens think about, and learn from, the news media. Other recent projects include an examination of heterogeneity in the effect of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on presidential approval, a study of the role of anxiety in American elections, and a study of the persuasive power of newspapers in Great Britain. His work has appeared in the American Journal of Political Science, Public Opinion Quarterly, Political Behavior, and Political Psychology. He earned his PhD in the Department of Politics at Princeton University, where he was a Woodrow Wilson Fellow. He is jointly appointed in the Department of Government and the Georgetown Public Policy Institute, where he teaches courses in statistical analysis, research design, media and politics, and representation.