Ismaharif Ismail

Ismaharif Ismail is a Ph.D. Candidate in at the Department of Communication at UC Santa Barbara, whose research broadly examines social cohesion and resilience, intergroup relations, and social identities in communication. His recent research focuses on how communication technologies are transforming intergroup communication and shaping broader intergroup dynamics. He uses a multimethod approach spanning laboratory experiments, longitudinal studies, fieldwork interventions, big-team science, latent variable modeling, and Monte Carlo simulations.

Ismaharif has published in leading journals across communication, psychology and the broader social sciences, including Human Communication Research, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Computers in Human Behavior, Social Psychological and Personality Science, and Political Psychology. His research has received international recognition, including top paper awards from the International Communication Association and National Communication Association. He has also received university and departmental recognition through the UCSB Regents Fellowship and Putnam Interdisciplinary Scholar Award.

Highlights

One dataset, many models: How analytic specification alters causal conclusions in communication research. Human Communication Research.

We used Monte Carlo simulations and structural equation modeling to show how model specification can change conclusions in intergroup communication, and the broader communication field.

Reaching across the aisle: Committed and optimistic citizens support a non‐preferred presidency and cooperate with electoral winners. Political Psychology.

After a bitterly contested election, democratic ideals expect electoral losers to overcome their defeat and rally behind their new non-preferred president. We examine these patterns of cooperation in the 2020 U.S. presidential elections.

Testing the bi-directional influence of media and identity: A longitudinal study of Muslim adolescents. Human Communication Research.

Situated in the context of American Muslim adolescents, we investigate the direction of relationship between social identity and media in a longitudinal 3-wave study following the 2016 U.S. presidential elections.

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