Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University

08/26/2026

Movies shape the way we think about love—sometimes more than we realize.

"Love Factually," a podcast co-hosted by IPR's Eli Finkel and UC Davis' Paul Eastwick, takes a research-based look at popular romantic films, like "When Harry Met Sally…," "Love & Basketball," and "Call Me By Your Name." Each episode unpacks what these movies get right—and wrong—about relationships.

The podcast was recently featured on The New York Times' list of 8 wellness podcasts worth adding to your queue.

Read the full list:

In case you’re looking for a new deep dive.

08/21/2026

At IPR, we provide the evidence that policymakers need to make people’s lives better. Learn more about how we turn interdisciplinary scholarship from across Northwestern University's schools into policy impact:

Andy Papachristos invites you to explore the research excellence th...

08/19/2026

IPR awarded six seed grants to seven faculty members and doctoral students from four disciplines. These modest awards—around a few thousand dollars each—are set to have a big impact in getting new research on timely topics off the ground. Read more:

IPR faculty use small grants as scaffolding for larger projects

08/17/2026

Every year, about 17% of low-wage workers in the U.S. are paid less than the minimum wage they are legally owed. On average, they lose 20% of their income. Between 2021 and 2023, more than 11 million workers lost wages this way.

In the Los Angeles area, IPR political scientist Daniel Galvin and his colleagues found that one in four fast-food workers were paid below the legal minimum in 2024.

These numbers raise an obvious question: Why does wage theft keep happening, even in states with strong labor laws on the books?

A new IPR and Workplace Justice Lab policy brief, based on forthcoming research in Regulation & Governance, has an answer. Galvin and his co-authors show that passing a law is only step one. What happens next—whether an agency uses the power it’s been given—matters just as much.

“The law is not self-enacting,” Galvin said. “It has to be enforced.”

Read more: http://spr.ly/6186B1OIgr

07/27/2026

Young voters are showing strong support for a Democratic socialist presidential candidate in a new poll—but what does that actually mean?

IPR's Tabitha Bonilla told FOX 32 Chicago that the survey does not clearly measure support for socialism itself and that some respondents may simply prefer a Democrat. She also said the results may reflect frustration with the economy and concerns about making ends meet.

Watch the full interview here:

A recent article found that 53% of voters ages 15–39 want a Democra...

07/22/2026

Sociologist and demographer Bridget Goosby opened her May 18 IPR colloquium the same way she opens all of her talks, by confirming what “race” is—and isn’t.

“[Race] is a social construction, it is not biological, and these categories are used to distinguish groups of people and maintain inequality and oppression,” she said.

That distinction is the foundation of her research. Race has no biological basis—but the experience of living as a racialized person in an unequal society leaves measurable marks on the body.

As a professor of sociology at the University of Texas at Austin and co-director of the LifeHD Health Disparities Research Lab, she is among the nation’s leading voices on how racism becomes physically embedded in the body over a lifetime.

Goosby’s work investigates exactly how that happens: the biosocial pathways through which social marginalization and resulting chronic stress translate into higher disease risk, faster biological aging, and shorter lives.

Her visit was the latest in IPR’s Visiting Scholars Program, which brings distinguished researchers to campus to share findings, collaborate with faculty, and engage students on pressing social policy questions. Read more: https://www.ipr.northwestern.edu/news/2026/how-the-social-becomes-biological.html

06/30/2026

📢We're hiring! IPR is looking for a Temporary Jr. Communications Coordinator to join our team on the Evanston campus this summer and fall.

This position provides high-level communications support to IPR faculty, students, staff, and visitors, with a hand in nearly everything we do—drafting and editing social media posts, working on editorial projects like articles and blog posts, editing photos and updating the website, helping run events from setup to cleanup, and supporting archival work, among other projects.

Click here to learn more and apply: http://spr.ly/6181BDL3JF

06/23/2026

In an opinion piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Kellogg School of Management sociologist and IPR associate Brayden King wrote that AI can improve scholarly writing when it's used to sharpen thinking, not replace it.

"What AI cannot give you is something worth saying. That part belongs to the scholar," he wrote. http://spr.ly/6184BDj976?

The new tools should sharpen your thinking rather than outsource it.

06/20/2026

A new study by pediatrician and IPR associate Craig Garfield and his colleagues finds that fathers die frequently in the first years of their child's life—from su***de, overdose, homicide, and accidental injury. Yet paternal mortality is rarely studied or tracked.

The study, the first of its kind published in a major medical journal, examined 130,267 babies born in Georgia in 2017 and tracked whether fathers died over the next five years. Of the 796 who did, 60% died from preventable causes.

"Our data show that fathers die frequently in the first years of their child's life, and we have no systems in place to understand how we might prevent it," Garfield said. "That's a huge blind spot."

Read more:

A new Northwestern University study analyzed rarely examined paternal mortality data and found 60% of deaths were preventable.

06/17/2026

American voters are more accepting of gay candidates than ever—but only if they look and act "straight."

A new study by Martin Naunov, an assistant professor of political science and IPR faculty associate, finds that while being gay no longer costs Democratic candidates votes, voters across party lines still penalize candidates who look or sound even slightly gender nonconforming.

The study found that among Republicans, being gay reduced a candidate's probability of support by roughly 22 percentage points. Among Democrats, the anti-gay penalty has largely vanished, but bias against gender nonconformity remains—at roughly the same rate as among Republicans.

"On the left, the bias against gay candidates has moved from 'don't be gay' to 'don't look or sound gay,'" Naunov said.

Read more:

A new study from Northwestern University sought to answer whether Americans have moved past prejudices against gay people, and what kind of gay candidates face little to no electoral penalty. The research reveals American voters are more accepting of gay candidates than at any point in our history,....