Experience

• UCLA

  Assistant Professor of Sociology

  My research focuses on categorical and behavioral boundary processes, cognition, and the causes and consequences of violence. These interests are reflected in my current book project as well as my published papers and ongoing research. First, I study wartime defection, or how people shift stances from support for state violence to resistance and saving behaviors within the same violent episode. Second, I investigate the relationship between social boundaries and political behaviors, with a specific interest in how racial, ethnic, and religious cleavages inform and are transformed by extreme violence such as genocide. Third, I analyze the relationship between cognition and perception at the micro-level of decision-making on violence. Here, I focus on how timing influences cognitive adaptation to violence and how shifts in social perception mediate this process. For more information and for links to my CV and publications, please visit www.alizaluft.com

• United Nations

  Research Assistant for the Counter-Terrorism Executive Directorate

  Aliza worked at United Nations as a Research Assistant for the Counter-Terrorism Executive Directorate

• Transitional Justice Data Base Project

  Affiliated Researcher

  Aliza worked at Transitional Justice Data Base Project as a Affiliated Researcher

• Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies

  Research Assistant

  Aliza worked at Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies as a Research Assistant

• USAID

  Research Consultant in tandem with Astraea and the Global Development Partnership

  Aliza worked at USAID as a Research Consultant in tandem with Astraea and the Global Development Partnership