Max Erdemandi

Max Erdemandi is a Ph.D. candidate in Communication Science & Social Cognition. He also holds an M.S. in Quantitative Methodology, Measurement, and Statistics from UMD, and an M.A. in Interdisciplinary Studies from Duke University. He serves on the faculty of the Global Terrorism Studies minor at UMD's National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START), teaching courses on risk communication and emergency management, and dis/misinformation and conspiracy theories. 

Max's research examines extreme cognitions and behaviors across several domains: dis/misinformation and conspiracy belief systems; extremist (social) identity expressions, discourses, and political ideologies, entertainment media, and risk and emergency communication His work also focuses on improving the tools and standards of scientific inquiry in social science, specifically media psychology, psycholinguistics, and social behavior. He studies how flawed measurement, external biases, and weak methodological practices can distort statistical findings. His work brings psychometric theory and statistical rigor to the center of these debates, with the goal of building more transparent, reproducible, and policy-relevant research grounded in better evidence.