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Staff profile

Overview

David Caldwell

Biography

I am a PhD student in the School of Government and International Affairs (SGIA) at the University of Durham. My doctoral research examines polarisation and ideological change among contemporary British voters. I analyse trends in economic and social attitude partisanship, attitude alignment and attitude dispersion, with a view to shedding light on electoral realignments currently unfolding in the UK and abroad. This research has been supported by grants from the Foundation for Progressive International Education (PINE), the Manchester Statistical Society and the Ustinov College Global Citizenship Programme.

I hold an MA (distinction) in Political Theory from the University of Durham, where I attended as a recipient of the Postgraduate Taught Scholarship Scheme in 2015/16, and a BA (first-class honours) in International Relations and Politics from De Montfort University, Leicester. I have also completed courses in Advanced Machine Learning for Social Scientists, Advanced Methods for the Analysis of Social Media and Textual Data, and Advanced Survey Data Analysis and Survey Experiments at the Essex Summer School in Social Science Data Analysis.

I am actively involved in undergraduate and postgraduate teaching in the department and am a member of the Café Politique team for the Ustinov College Global Citizenship Programme. Since beginning my PhD studies, I have also served as President of the SGIA PhD Association during 2019 and completed additional research assistant work related to the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021 impact case study – Middle East Security and Policy-making, along with various other projects associated with the Centre for Institutions and Political Behaviour.

Research Groups

Institutions and Political Behaviour

Research Interests

  • British Politics
  • Ideology and Public Opinion
  • Polarisation
  • Quantitative Research Methods

Teaching

  • SGIA 49915 - Statistical Exploration and Reasoning (Level 4)
  • SGIA 2371 - Crisis and Conflict in European Politics (Level 2)
  • SGIA 1201 - Researching Politics and International Relations (Level 1)