Hello! Welcome to Policy – simplified. I wanted to take a moment to introduce myself and explain how the blog works.

I love research. I’ve worked in multiple research labs and have spent quite a few hours digging through databases and reading papers in the past few years. My main areas of focus are social psychology, cognition, and politics. I’ve worked in the healthcare field for over 10 years in a variety of positions – from pre-hospital EMS to level 1 trauma center. I am not a doctor, but I am working toward a PhD. My goal is to use my experiences and enjoyment for reading wordy documents to help simplify the often overly complex (and at times, emotionally charged) policy documents to make sure the important parts aren’t lost in the fluff.

I want to make it clear that I am by no means a professional politician. My goal is to challenge or support current policy through the lens of psychology, cognition, and philosophy – or in other words, from a multifaceted perspective. I hope to produce discussion with these posts! If you think there’s something i’ve missed, have a question about something i cite in text, or have an alternate perspective on what something is getting at, please leave a comment. I think collaboration is essential to forming thorough conclusions and would love to hear what you have to say!

This blogs purpose is twofold – to give myself a place to jot down my thoughts so i can challenge my own beliefs/perspectives, as well as to hopefully help others by offering a more everyday, conversational, approach to politics. I currently do not claim a political party; I’m not really a fan of either of the common US party options. In light of this, my goal is to approach these posts from an objective/empirically supported position, not from the viewpoint of a political party.

The blog posts will be formatted similarly to research papers:

i’ll begin with an Abstract section- this paragraph will simply be the “down and dirty” summary of what the important take-aways are from the publication, as well as any highlights or glaring issues it may present. If you only have a few minutes to spend reading, this section is designed to leave you with a decent idea of what the policy states and intends to accomplish.

next will be the Introduction section – i’ll summarize the publication using plain language, breaking it down by paragraph. If there are any items that require definitions, i’ll provide then in text. I’ll introduce any points i plan to clarify or investigate in the following sections, as well as give necessary background/context for claims made or ideas introduced in the publication.

following the intro will be the Evaluation section – here is where i’ll break down the individual points i highlighted in the intro. I’ll challenge claims that are false or misleading, provide additional insight that may have been overlooked, and/or provide research support for the claims made. This will be a more “academic” style read, but i’ll do my best to still keep it simple and will use in text citations to support any claims or refutes I make.

the Discussion section is where i’ll make my final summary, draw conclusions based on the content of the publication, and hypothesize about future implications. I’ll also use this section to point out any areas i had trouble finding evidence to support or refute claims made in the publication the post is evaluating.

While not a part of any research paper i’ve found, the last real “content” section will be titled IMO – In My Opinion. As the title suggests, this is where i’ll provide purely opinion based thoughts, concerns, or endorsements for the content and/or its implications. If parts of a publication are potentially problematic, this is also where i’ll propose an alternate perspective and why it may be more helpful than what was proposed. My goal is to make this section conversational- so please feel free to give me your perspectives as well!

last but not least, the References section. I’m a big supporter of citing sources, so anything i reference in text will be listed here in case you want to do some additional reading on your own.

have a specific policy you would like me to go over?

use the contact form below to email me and request one! i’ll do my best to get to anything requested.

Thanks for reading! Lets get started…