Aaron Ye

About

I’m an expert in media analytics, political communication, and health communication. Using both quantitative and qualitative methods, I study U.S. media dynamics with a focus on institutional polarization, media-driven mass polarization, and digital political and health messaging. I analyze and model the communication strategies of media outlets, government agencies, health institutions, politicians, and citizens across digital platforms.Examples of projects include:1) A systematic and comprehensive analysis of how 131 U.S. news media outlets—spanning the ideological spectrum—covered three major polarizing issues: COVID-19, the war in Ukraine, and the war in Gaza. This work led to the development of the Media-Accelerated Polarization (MAP) model, which posits that the interplay between media bias, algorithmic amplification, socioeconomic stressors, and digital virality drives political polarization across thousands of U.S. communities.2) A global media influence model during the war in Ukraine, revealing how media ecosystems in U.S.-allied countries constructed strategic and conflict narratives distinct from those produced by adversarial or non-aligned media networks.3) Novel insights into the communication strategies of 2022 U.S. House of Representatives election winners, demonstrating that incorporating communication patterns significantly improved predictive models of electoral success.4) A national-scale analysis of citizen communication on Twitter during the COVID-19 pandemic, showing that patterns of public discourse were stronger predictors of local mortality and vaccination rates than socioeconomic or political variables.Together, these studies reveal how communication strategies shape media coverage, public engagement, and political messaging, while highlighting the role of digital amplification in influencing public attitudes. They provide a foundation for developing more effective and targeted communication strategies across domains. Areas of expertise: U.S. and global media analytics. News collection, coding, qualitative and quantitative analysis. Data analytics. Computational journalism. Social media and audience engagement. Digital networks and amplification cascades. Network modeling. Topic and sentiment analysis. Political psychology: in/out-group partisan cues, construal level of communication. Multivariate regression models. Surveys and public opinion. Strategic, conflict and crisis communication. U.S. politics and electoral processes. Political communication. Partisan divisions and mass polarization.