Florian S. Schaffner
Postdoctoral Researcher
Department of Political Science
University of Zurich
About Me
I am a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Political Science at the University of Zurich. My research focuses on political behavior, political psychology, affective polarization, empathy, representation, and direct democracy. Moreover, I am interested in methodological issues in quantitative text analysis and machine learning. In my doctoral dissertation at the University of Oxford, I studied the effects of empathy on political behavior. I also hold an MSc in Comparative Politics from the London School of Economics and Political Science and a BA in Social Sciences from the University of Zurich.
Education
DPhil in Politics
University of Oxford, 2024
MSc in Comparative Politics
London School of Economics and Political Science, 2018
BA in Social Sciences
University of Zurich, 2016
Publications
Schaffner, Florian S. (2020) Moaners, Gloaters, and Bystanders: Perceived Fairness of the United Kingdom’s 2016 Referendum on the European Union. Political Studies, 69(2), 278–306. Link
Working Papers
Florian Schaffner, Philipp Broniecki, Lucas Leemann, Reto Wüest (2024) Machine Learning Ensembles and Deep Interactions for Multilevel Regression and Poststratification (MrP) Models
Engler, Sarah, Lucas Leemann, Florian Schaffner (2024) Parties and the People: Why Do Parties Support Direct Democracy?
Schaffner, Florian (2023) Empathy and Affective Polarization After the Brexit Referendum
Teaching
Quantitative Text Analysis (Postgraduate), Department of Political Science, University of Zurich, Spring Semester 2024
Political Systems and Theories II (Undergraduate), Department of Political Science, University of Zurich, Spring Semester 2024
Political Systems and Theories I (Undergraduate), Department of Political Science, University of Zurich, Fall Semester 2023
Quantitative Text Analysis (Postgraduate), Department of Political Science, University of Zurich, Spring Semester 2023
Political Systems and Theories II (Undergraduate), Department of Political Science, University of Zurich, Spring Semester 2023
Political Systems and Theories I (Undergraduate), Department of Political Science, University of Zurich, Fall Semester 2022
Intermediate Statistics (Postgraduate), Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford, Michaelmas Term 2021
Intermediate Statistics (Postgraduate), Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford, Michaelmas Term 2020
Thesis Supervision (Undergraduate), Wadham College, University of Oxford, Trinity Term 2020
Introduction to Statistics (Postgraduate), Faculty of Law, University of Oxford, Michaelmas Term 2019
Software
websearchr: Access Domains and Search Popular Websites. R package, available on CRAN
bodleianlibraries: Search the Bodleian Libraries Catalogue (SOLO) directly from the R console. R package, available on GitHub
xaringanbeamer: Beamer theme for the xaringan package. R package, available on GitHub
Xplorer: Convenient Data Exploration. R package, available on GitHub
Contact
Florian S. Schaffner
Department of Political Science
University of Zurich
Affolternstrasse 56
8050 Zurich
Switzerland
Office: AFL-H-304
E-mail: schaffner@ipz.uzh.ch