My research employs mixed methodologies to explore sensemaking around axes of social difference, and how this process is informed by social and cultural change over time. In my dissertation, From Deviance to Diagnosis: Cultural Meanings of Mental Health, I use computational text analysis to analyze discourse and language around mental health in the news media and on social media. I focus on how mental health and illness are both normalized and “otherized” in the cultural imagination.
I’m also passionate about equitable and inclusive teaching, particularly of quantitative methods and statistical software.
I have a BA from Wellesley College, where I majored in Sociology and Spanish. In addition to my work in the Sociology Department, I work as a Center for Teaching and Learning graduate student consultant, as a graduate research assistant at the Stanford VMWare Women’s Leadership Innovation Lab, and as a software consultant for Stanford Library’s Software and Services for Data Science (SSDS).
Contact me at aljohnson [at] stanford [dot] edu
My academic interests fall into three main areas:
Research on mental health
How are mental health and illness conceptualized in our cultural imagination?
Teaching and learning
How can our sociology classrooms (especially our quantitative methods) be more inclusive and equitable?
Recent Publications
*please contact me for access to paywalled papers
Changes in Mental Health and Treatment, 1997-2017
Journal of Health and Social Behavior. 62(1):53-68.
The Agency Myth: Persistence in Individual Explanations for Gender Inequality
with Emily Carian. Social Problems. 69(1):123-142.
Teaching for a Data-Driven Future: Intentionally Building Foundational Computing Skills
with Rebecca Gleit. Teaching Sociology. 50(1):49-61.
All images courtesy of Unsplash.