Honors Theses

All QSS majors are required to complete an independent research project in the student's last year on campus. The student may choose to complete either a senior honors thesis (which takes a full academic year) or a one quarter research project. All QSS research projects--honors theses and one quarter projects--are supervised by QSS-affiliated faculty at Dartmouth. QSS research projects are independent, meaning that each student completes his or own project. However, QSS students working on research are embedded in a network of advisers and other QSS students. All QSS research projects must be publicly defended upon completion.

How to Complete an Honors Thesis in QSS

QSS Honors Thesis Guidelines

What's it like to write a QSS thesis

Daniella Nichols presents her QSS honors thesis, "Damage Inequality: A Spatial Analysis of Social Vulnerability and Hurricane Helene Infrastructure Damage in Western North Carolina.”
Hiba Ali Presents her QSS honors thesis, "The Effect of Federally Elected Officials' Health Messaging on Public Engagement and Sentiment on X."
Ava Politis presents her QSS honors thesis, “Should I Stay or Should I Go: Analysis of Major League Baseball's Arbitration Process.”
Benjamin Shaman presents his QSS honors thesis, “Is it Good for Farmers? Sustainable Agriculture and Northern New England Farmers’ Perceptions of Resilience.”
Anna Block presents her QSS honors thesis, “The Impact of Social Cohesion on Urban Community Garden Ecology and Permanence.”
Shreya Kumar presents her QSS honors thesis, “Homophily and Community Structure of Political Deepfake Propagation.”
Tracy Weener presents her QSS honors thesis, “AI-Mediated Conversations for Geopolitical Persuasion: Evidence from Taiwan.”
Malachai Ah Yo presents his QSS honors thesis, “Vox Machinae in Deserto: Gender and Artificiality Shape Trust in AI-Generated Voices.”
Diana (Zixuan) Wang presents her QSS honors thesis, “Autocratic Genderwashing: How Gender Quotas Shape International Perceptions.”
Sam Haskel presents his QSS honors thesis, “How We Think: The Impact of Peer Pressure on Decision Making.”
Miaoxuan (Hermia) Huang presents her QSS thesis, “Cross-Border Diffusion of Open-Source AI Models: A Quantitative Approach towards the Political Economy of AI.”
Daniel Hernandez presents his QSS honors thesis, “The Effect of Margin Financing on Volatility in China’s Equity Markets.”
Sarnika Ali presents her QSS honors thesis, “The Unspoken and the Unseen: An Analysis of Victim Gender and Linguistic Framing of Sexual Assault in Judicial Discourse.”
William Zheng present his QSS honors thesis, “Mandates, Markets, and Megawatts: An Empirical Analysis of the Causal Effects of Energy Storage Targets on Utility-Scale Battery Storage Deployment.”
Niccolo Compolo presents his QSS honors thesis, “The Effect of Wait Time at the U.S.-Mexico Border on the Retail Price of Fresh Tomatoes in the United States.”
Lily Levick presents her QSS honors thesis, “Transit Infrastructure and Neighborhood Change: The Impact of the Q Train Expansion on Commercial Space Use in New York City's Upper East Side.”
Alexa Strauss presents her QSS honors thesis, “Interfaith Marriage and Religious Identity Formation: Disentangling Selection and Institutional Effects.”
Mary Ford presents her QSS honors thesis, “Homes of Interest: An Analysis of the Housing Markets of Oranienburg, Dachau, and the Four Villages.”
Christian Chantayan presents his QSS honors thesis, “Abandoning the Jackpot? Public Policy Rationales, Goal Displacement, and State Lotteries.”