Evan Stewart

A screenshot of the Sociological Methods & Research website showing the special issue title

I’m delighted to share that the August 2025 special issue of Sociological Methods & Research on Generative AI is out now. Along with my co-editor, Daniel Karell, we put together this issue to build on the conference we organized last year.

Here's a thread on each of the ten papers:

Thanks Cinzia!! Very happy & thankful to work with you all 😁

Assistant Professor (Sociology) - Boston, Massachusetts job with University of Massachusetts Boston | 1310899 The Department of Sociology at the University of Massachusetts Boston (UMB) invites qualified persons to apply for a tenure-track assistant profess...

**I'll be at ASA if you'd like to chat about the position. Reach out by email.**

The Department of Sociology at the University of Massachusetts Boston is hiring a TT assistant professor with strengths in the soc of gender/sexualities: careercenter.asanet.org/job/1310899/...

Over the last 30 years, people a) walk faster in urban spaces; and b) linger less often according to an AI-Assisted study of video footage in Boston, Philadelphia, and New York: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Feature-based reward learning shapes human social learning strategies - Nature Human Behaviour This research advances a mechanistic reward learning account of social learning strategies. Through experiments and simulations, it shows how individuals learn to learn from others, dynamically shapin...

Through experiments and simulations, this study shows how individuals learn to learn from others, dynamically shaping the processes involved in cultural evolution. @davidschultner.bsky.social @bjornlindstrom.bsky.social
@lucasmolleman.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Nothing wrong with getting tenure and pivoting to something else that supports your department, but also this is 100% why I’m a fan of building labs/other collaborative systems in sociology. We of all disciplines should know about social structure!

💼 Well-connected, underpaid?

Dr. @jessistreib.bsky.social’s #Socius study explores how class-privileged students face #LaborMarket uncertainty—challenging assumptions in #SociologyOfEducation about #SocialCapital and economic reward.

Read: doi.org/10.1177/2378...

In addition to the original UK results, we have now ***replicated*** this (TWICE) in the US.

The main findings hold strong: information diets are a lot more diverse in attention than in engagement.

New version here: osf.io/preprints/os...

The Department of Sociology at the University of Massachusetts Boston (UMB) invites qualified persons to apply for a tenure-track assistant professor position to join our faculty beginning September 1, 2026. Candidates should have demonstrated research and teaching strengths in the sociology of gender/sexualities with a preference for candidates who can teach Queer Theory/Methods. Candidates who are able to teach a first-year course for sociology majors requiring qualitative methods preferred. Candidates should have an emerging/established research program with the potential to generate external funding, a strong commitment to teaching and mentoring, the capacity to expand diversity initiatives on campus, and enhance the university’s commitment to public service.

We are HIRING @umbsociology.bsky.social! Gender, sexuality, theory. I'm not on the hiring committee (sabbatical 😈), but feel free to DM or say hi at ASA if you have questions. #socsky
employmentopportunities.umb.edu/boston/en-us...

Catholic clergy are speaking out on immigration − more than any other political issue except abortion New research from sociologists finds that local Catholic leaders are more likely than many other Christian clergy to speak about immigration with their congregations.

#Catholic priests discuss #immigration with their congregations more than leaders of most other faiths, according to new research.

By @evanstewart.bsky.social and Diane Beckman @umassboston.bsky.social:
theconversation.com/catholic-cle...

I would say so. Or, maybe belief primes work differently in different cases. Either way - cool stuff to think about!

Sure, I work in a corner of research that might think priming belief --> activates religious identities --> increased coop with in group, decreased coop with out group. The competing hypothesis supported by Mikey's work is totally valid, I just would have bet on the other side before seeing results.

Wow, I genuinely would not expect this finding. Cool new work!

Maybe I'll elaborate on this later, but just to point out briefly: Notice how *knowledge* is implicitly not a factor in assessing debates on 'immigration' or 'Israel-Palestine.' In case you needed more evidence of the transformation of the academic humanities into nonacademic HR work:

In an age of religious/political polarization, we see a lot of partisan sorting. There may be two clear camps there, but research still needs to be careful not to *homogenize* people. American religion is high variance! Cool new work on this:

Partisanship Meets Social Networks: How Politically Heterogeneous Acquaintances and Close Relationships Buffer Partisan Animosity Article: Partisanship Meets Social Networks: How Politically Heterogeneous Acquaintances and Close Relationships Buffer Partisan Animosity | Sociological Science | Posted July 7, 2025

New study finds that politically diverse social networks, even casual acquaintances, reduce partisan hostility by exposing people to others with opposing views, correcting stereotypes, and fostering understanding.
sociologicalscience.com/articles-v12...

I saw a big improvement when I set a hard "no coffee after noon" rule. It's very hard to keep the rule at 12:15pm, but really nice at 11:00pm.

Apathy Over Attacks on Higher Education Needs to Change If Americans don’t fight back against efforts to dismantle higher education, the U.S. will lose lifesaving medical research, innovation that spurs our economy and the ability to freely study science a...

Few Americans actively support the Trump admin's attacks on higher ed. But, our data show that many seem to have no problem with it.

@stecula.bsky.social ‬and I discuss why Americans should *demand* that our elected officials stand up for higher ed.

www.scientificamerican.com/article/atta...

Public Religion and Gendered Attitudes Abstract. Do religious commitments hinder support for gender equality and contribute to the stalled gender revolution as a social problem? Answering this q

How do religious beliefs shape gender attitudes? Research from @evanstewart.bsky.social, @pennye.bsky.social, and @jackdelehanty.bsky.social shows how public and private theology, tradition, and identity intersect in everyday gender politics doi.org/10.1093/socpro/spad012

Srefs are new to me and I’m going to be thinking about “srefs as cultural repertoires” for a while.

A more interesting upside of AI Does AI provide anything to look forward to, if “super-intelligence” sounds boring?

This post tries to explain why I find language models exciting. But it doesn't try to persuade skeptics that they should agree. It's aimed more at people already working with AI, and its goal is to sharpen our collective sense of what the upside potential might be. #MLSky 🤖 🧪

YouTube video by Architectural Digest Inside NPR's Tiny Desk Set Full of Priceless Objects | Set Tour | Architectural Digest

Architectural Digest x Tiny Desk

(Sadly, AD did not want to hear BTS on GWAR) www.youtube.com/watch?v=ka1D...

With all the typical caveats (e.g. self-reports), we think this is useful for research on religion & public opinion, especially because it helps to explain why rank-and-file Catholics may be evenly divided on immigration attitudes.

Predicted Values for Congregation Race x Catholic Interaction. Plot presents marginal predictions and 84 percent CIs (corresponding to p < .05 significance level) for the likelihood of discussing immigration by congregational characteristics. Majority-hispanic congregational leaders are more likely to discuss immigration than majority-white congregational leaders, and this effect is more pronounced for Catholics than others.

They say they talk about it at higher rates than other issues & leaders in other religious traditions. But that doesn't mean congregational characteristics don't matter. We also find Catholic leaders of majority-Hispanic congregations are more likely to talk about it — clearly some responsiveness.

Plot showing proportion of leaders discussing immigration relative to other issues. This figure reports weighted estimates and 84% CIs (corresponding to p < .05 significance level) for the proportion of religious leaders in each denominational group who report discussing each issue with their congregations. Issues are ordered according to the ranked prevalence among Catholic congregations to facilitate comparison. Catholic leaders say they discuss immigration more than other issues (save for abortion), and they say this at higher rates than leaders in other denominations.

Diane points out cross-pressure on the case of immigration — Catholic social teaching on immigration is pretty clear, but polarization means that message may not fly with increasingly conservative congregants. So, what do clergy say they do? In NSRL data, they report talking about immigration.

Clergy Talk: Do Catholic Priests Discuss Immigration? Social science research has long discussed the interaction of political and religious ideologies in attitude formation and political socialization. Most research focuses on the role of these forces...

When leaders have cross-partisan pressure, do they talk about political issues or avoid them? Now out @socfocus.bsky.social, @umbsociology.bsky.social PhD candidate Diane Beckman & I look at the case of Catholic leaders to explore this question:
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

As C Wright Mills said in The Sociological Imagination, you often learn more from bad books than from good ones -- because the bad books can prompt you to clarify your own thinking. Why is this book bad? What's wrong with the arguments? Why is something apparently appealing in fact misleading? Etc

I have said this before, but eliminating programs that teach a lot of students but don’t have many majors is like a restaurant not buying flour in its grocery delivery because people aren’t ordering flour on the menu.

Amazing!!!! Congratulations!! 🥳

Varieties of Nonreligious Experience: Expanding Understandings of Nonreligious Wellbeing Religious commitment has long been associated with health and happiness in the United States. However, despite a period of drastic decline in religious affiliation among Americans, much less is known...

Check this out if you're interested in religion and well-being too.

Varieties of Nonreligious Experience: Expanding Understandings of Nonreligious Wellbeing - Frost/Edgell/Miller, Sociology of Health & Illness onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...