SHORTLE CV

Education
B.A. (summa cum laude), Union College, 2005
Ph.D., The Ohio State University, 2012

Research Fields: Religion, Race, Gender, Immigration, Political Behavior, Political Psychology, Policy Attitudes, Community-engaged research

Courses: Exit Poll; Public Opinion; Immigration Politics; Experiments; Group Attitudes and Behaviors; Religion and Politics; American Federal Government

About me: I am a professor and the Director of Graduate Studies of Political Science at the University of Oklahoma, where I study group identity in the context of American political behavior. I also serve as a faculty member for Latinx Studies and Women's and Gender Studies. I run OU’s Community Engagement + Experiments Laboratory (CEEL), Oklahoma City’s Community Poll (Exit Poll), and OU’s Democracy Survey of OU freshmen. For fun, I like to lend research support to organizations seeking to increase civic engagement and improve the democratic health of their local communities. 

The Rural Talent Lab:
​I am working with state agencies - in Kansas, Pennsylvania, Montana, New Hampshire, and West Virginia - as part of a trans-disciplinary and cross-university research team (Appalachian State,  OU, the University of Kentucky, UT San Antonio) to examine how to improve educational and workforce outcomes for low-income rural Americans across five states. This is an Ascendium Education Group-funded project.  

Religion and Democracy:
I was a 2023-2025 Public Religion Research Fellow. I am also a non-resident fellow with the Pulaski Institution, a think tank charged with promoting democracy in the American Heartland. 
My co-authored Cambridge University Press book, The Everyday Crusade: Christian Nationalism in American Politics (2022 – w. Eric L. McDaniel and Irfan Nooruddin), was awarded an "Outstanding Academic Title" distinction from the American Library Association's Choice Reviews. In it, we examine the relationship between American religious exceptionalism and prejudicial and antidemocratic attitudes.

Teaching:
At the doctoral level, I teach courses on group attitudes and behaviors, public opinion/political psychology, and American political behavior. At the undergraudate level, I primarily teach American Federal Government and Exit Poll: Field Research Methods.