Notable Scholars and Business Leaders share Research and Inspiration with Next Generation of Computational Social Scientists

This blog post is the fifth of nine in a series called “The Future of Computational Social Science is Black” about SICSS-Howard/Mathematica 2021, the first Summer Institute in Computational Social Science held at a Historically Black College or University. To learn more SICSS-H/M read the first post in the series.

SICSS-Howard/Mathematica participants were joined by four guest speakers during the second week: Ruha Benjamin, PhD, Chris Wheat, PhD, Naomi Sugie, PhD, and Laura Nelson, PhD. Speakers shared their recent and ongoing projects of pertinence to the field of computational social science.

Monday, June 21st, 2021

Ruha Benjamin, Professor of African American studies at Princeton University, was the first guest speaker at SICSS-Howard Mathematica. Her work sits at the intersection of science, medicine, and technology; highlighting innovation, inequity, power, and race. Her presentation, “2020 Vision: Reimagining the Default Settings of Technology and Society” addressed discriminatory biases built into the various technologies that run our world, becoming the “New Jim Code” as Ruha calls it. An example of this discriminatory design are benches built to prevent the homeless from sleeping on them. According to Benjamin, the avant-garde aspects of innovation cause ignorance about their impacts and the social norms inherent in their use, which make technology seem so desirable, blind us to their negative effects. She urged participants to think about the evolution of racism in our connected world. Specifically how racism might be folded into technological innovation. She stressed that in the absence of discussions on equity and technology our communities will continue to be mistreated by advances in technology.

Professor Benjamin shared personal anecdotes and advice about the academy during her Q&A sessions with our graduate student, postdoc, and faculty participants. She shared tips on setting boundaries and avoiding burnout as a scholar of color, what to look for when scoping out universities and programs when you are on the job market, and how the participants can help grow supportive and vibrant communities wherever they are. Many participants noted that Dr. Benjamin’s incredible talk and candid Q+A were a particularly memorable part of their experience.

Tuesday, June 22nd, 2021

Chris Wheat, the Co-President for the JPMorgan Chase Institute, was the second speaker at SICSS-H/M. Wheat dedicates his time to helping the financial security of businesses and consumers using data but is no stranger to the academy, having previously taught entrepreneurship, social network analysis, strategy, global microfinance, and economic sociology. His lecture, titled “How to make a Useful Chart,” touched upon data collection of financial statuses of small businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic and the potential to apply one’s skills and questions to help policymakers make wiser decisions. Various charts complemented his presentation, displaying the changes from pre-quarantine to the present and the differences between Black, White, Asian, and Hispanic-owned small businesses during the pandemic.

During Wheat’s live Q&A he talked about how his background in fintech, algorithms, and sociology is useful in his work at the JPMorgan Chase Institute. He offered insights into academic and non-academic research as someone involved with both. Audience members were eager to learn about his institute’s work with policymakers who come to them with specific questions and how they engage with non-profits and other researchers to receive feedback on their consulting processes.

Wednesday, June 23rd, 2021

Naomi Sugie, Associate Professor of Criminology, Law at UC Irvine, was the third speaker of the week. Sugie’s passions lie in the realms of incarceration, criminal justice and the resulting social stigma in the labor force, the political system, and other governmental institutions. She presented “Work as Foraging: A Smartphone Study of Job Search and Employment after Prison,” her study on prisoners after their re-entry into the job market. This experiment involved a mix of methodological techniques, including using smartphones, focus groups, and her app, to show that incarcerated people take on temporary and income-driven jobs because they are at a disadvantage. Her thoughtfulness in the construction of the experiment provided a great example to attendees curious about how she weighed up possible ethical implications. Sugie outlined her approach to protecting the subjects by giving them agency by presenting opt-in or opt-out choices and heavily guarding the data collected, transferred, and stored.

During Professor Sugie’s live Q&A she explained her study in greater detail, particularly her usage of smartphones. She continued to stress the importance of smartphones to capture people’s experiences and how feasible they are as data collection devices. Many SICSS participants were also very intrigued by the high participation rate Sugie was able to achieve. She credited group meetings she held with staving off participant mistrust and concerns. Additional topics discussed included the Institutional Review Board process, working with computer scientists, and funding.

Thursday, June 24th, 2021

Laura Nelson, Assistant Professor of Sociology at Northeastern University, was the last SICSS-Howard/Mathematica guest speaker. Professor Nelson employs text analysis to her research on social movements, culture, gender, institutions, and organizations. She presented her piece entitled "Leveraging the Alignment Between Intersectionality and Machine Learning," which explores the interaction between the categorization of social identities and systems of power as well as the issues that arise when merging machine learning and inferential statistics. She also touched upon the importance of the Fragile Families dataset, an exercise that SICSS participants engaged with during Day 5, and explained that even some of the best predictions were only slightly better than the simple benchmark model.

During Professor Nelson’s live Q&A session she advised participants on approximating p-values and confidence intervals to get past the reviewers of traditional journals who still require the inferential statistics component. In response to a question about what she would like to see in the future, she brought up her wish to see more social scientists interested in Pinterest with its space for sharing images as “pictures [like numbers] can travel more seamlessly across different cultures.” The audience was also curious about the ethics within digital analysis and the critiques that one may face while studying intersectionality, and Nelson provided knowledge on staying true to being ethical and the core of intersectional analysis.

Guest speaker presentations and live Q&A were fruitful, with many participants (and speakers) getting the chance to meet other academics they admire in the room. We would like to thank Dr. Benjamin, Dr. Wheat, Dr. Sugie, and Dr. Nelson once again for taking the time to share their work with the next generation of computational social scientists.

For more information about SICSS-Howard/Mathematica 2022 and the application procedure, check out our website. Also follow us on Twitter, like us on Facebook, and join our email list!

About the authors

Kristina Hiraishi is a third-year undergraduate at the University of California, Berkeley, pursuing a degree in Data Science with an emphasis in Economics. Kristina served as a research assistant project lead, and co-lab manager in the AAC&U award-winning, Berkeley-based Interdisciplinary Research Group on Privacy under PhD Candidate Naniette Coleman. Kristina served as an Event Assistant for SICSS-Howard/Mathematica 2021, focusing on participant experience and background research.

Naniette H. Coleman is a PhD candidate in sociology at the University of California Berkeley and a multi-year UC-National Laboratory Graduate Fellow (Los Alamos). She is the only social scientist selected for this distinction in the history of the program. Naniette is also the founder and lead organizer of the first Summer Institute in Computational Social Science at a Historically Black College of University, SICSS-Howard/Mathematica 2021. Naniette’s work sits at the intersection of the sociology of culture and organizations and focuses on cybersecurity, surveillance, and privacy in the US context. Specifically, Naniette’s research examines how organizations assess risk, make decisions, and respond to data breaches and organizational compliance with state, federal, and international privacy laws. Naniette holds a Master of Public Administration with a specialization in Democracy, Politics, and Institutions from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and both an M.A. in Economics and a B.A. in Communication from the University at Buffalo, SUNY. A non-traditional student, Naniette’s prior professional experience includes local, state, and federal service, as well as work for two international organizations, and two universities. I welcome the opportunity to write about and talk about my research and my efforts to make CSS more diverse. Please reach out via my website: naniettecoleman.com.