Michiko Ueda-Ballmer

Michiko Ueda is an associate professor in the Public Administration and International Affairs Department at the Maxwell School and is a senior research associate in the Center for Policy Research. Her research interests include social determinants of health, suicide prevention, mental health policy, public health, and computational social science.

In her current projects, she examines the psychological conditions of distressed individuals through the analysis of crisis chat service data and social media using natural language processing; studies the consequences and determinants of loneliness and social isolation; investigates the impact of media (both traditional and social media) on suicide deaths and mental health; conducts online randomized controlled trials in diverse cultural settings to promote help-seeking behavior among distressed individuals; explores the effects of COVID-19 and food insecurity on mental health and suicide; measures the implicit level of loneliness in Japan and the United States using the IAT (Implicit Association Test); and examines the well-being of traditionally underrepresented groups in international STEM communities.