Lucas Ophoff is a fourth–year statistics and political science double major and mathematics minor. His thesis analyzes the impact of online misinformation on voter behavior in the United States and the Philippines. By combining voter records with Twitter data, Lucas examines which subgroups of the electorate are more likely to turn out to vote and donate after online engagement with misinformation, controlling for partisan leaning and demographic variables. Focusing on the 2020 U.S. presidential election, his research contributes to our growing understanding of electoral incentives, social networks, and the impact of political misinformation. Lucas is also involved with the Statistics Club and Social Inequality Data Science Lab. After graduation, Lucas plans to pursue a Ph.D. in statistics.
