Research

My research program operates at the intersection of Latino politics, political psychology, computational methods, and the study of American democracy. My work uses innovative theory and methods to analyze the profound tensions between identity, political behavior, and democratic stability in the 21st century.

Current Projects

Reframing Latino Acculturation in Political Science I developed the Dynamic Acculturation Model (DAM) using comparative cluster analysis, revealing that existing binary frameworks misclassify over 75% of Latinos who actually navigate hybrid cultural positions. This work provides new theoretical and methodological foundations for understanding political behavior.

Modeling Latino Electoral Behavior (2016-2024) Using Random Forest algorithms with SHAP interpretation methods, I analyze changing Latino voting patterns across recent presidential elections to understand partisan realignment and evolving gender gaps in political behavior.

Measuring Democratic Health in Diverse Societies As Co-Principal Investigator on a $100,000 Democracy Initiative grant, I led an interdisciplinary working group, consisting of 8 tenured faculty and three post-docs, developing new tools to measure whether different groups have genuine power-sharing and political equity in democratic societies.

[Picture]

Multiracial Democracy Working Group: bottom left - Alex Chávez, Mark Sanders, Luis Fraga, Atalia Omer, Dianne Pinderhughes; top left - Karen Graubart, Marisel Moreno, Francisco Robles, Ricardo Ramirez, Jessala Grijalva

Grants & Fellowships

Research Grants

Democracy Initiative Catalyst Grant, University of Notre Dame, 2025-2027 ($100,000) - Co-Principal Investigator and Grant Author

Major Fellowships

National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, 2020-2023 ($138,000)
Joseph L. Gaia Distinguished Fellowship, University of Notre Dame, 2018-2020 ($29,000)
ICPSR Diversity Scholarship, 2020 ($8,000)
Rooney Center for the Study of American Democracy Award, 2019 ($3,800)

Publications

Manuscripts Under Review

"Beyond Binaries: Testing A Dynamic Acculturation Model With Comparative Cluster Analysis." Under review.
"Navigating Political Cross-Pressures: Identity, Acculturation, And Political Diversity." Under review.

Check out my Github

Works in Progress

"The Shifting Electorate: Modeling Latino Vote Choice, 2016-2024" (Data analysis stage)
"From Description to Inference: A Framework for Theory-Driven Cluster Analysis" (Preparing for submission)

Conference Presentations

"Redefining Latino Acculturation through Comparative Cluster Analysis." APSA Annual Meeting, 2025
"Navigating Cross-Pressures: How Multidimensional Acculturation Shapes Latino Political Behavior." Keeping the Republic Conference, 2025
"Navigating Cross-Pressures: How Acculturation Shapes Latino Political Behavior." MPSA Annual Conference, 2025
"Exploring Latino Acculturation Through Non-Parametric Cluster Analysis." MAPOR Annual Conference, 2024

Methodological Expertise

Advanced Training (ICPSR Summer Programs)

Machine Learning Applications in Social Science Research (2025)
Measurement, Scaling, and Dimensional Analysis; Categorical Data Analysis (2020)
Race, Ethnicity, and Quantitative Methodology; Regression Analysis; Process-Tracing (2019)

Research Capabilities

Research Design
Machine learning (Random forest, cluster analysis)
Survey design and psychometric measurement
Advanced statistical methods
R / Python / SQL

Public Scholarship

Grijalva, J. A. & Fraga, L. R. (2025). "Latino support for Trump in 2024: Trends and insights from an empirical analysis." Political Science Now, APSA's 2024 Post-Election Reflection Series. Read