About

Biography

I am currently a lecturer at Stellenbosch University in the field of Operations Research and Business Analytics. My teaching has been focused on linear programming, decision theory, social network analytics and information systems. My postgraduate teaching involves supervising students on short-term projects in collaboration with industry partners. This allows for students to apply their optimisation and mathematical modelling knowledge to real-world problems and gain industry experience during their studies.

My research focus relates to natural language processing tasks and simulation frameworks applied to information spread, affective computing and mental health research. I supervise students on research applying machine learning, emotion detection, data science and data analysis, all towards improved decision-making and optimisation in an ever-evolving technological space. I have an interest in language models and advancements in natural language processing for domain-specific tasks, as well as for improving digital health and well-being within an expanding information economy.

Research interests

My research sits at the intersection of Operations Research and Computational Social Science. Both fields are domains in their own right, and the specific techniques I work with draw from one, the other, or both. I enjoy the challenge of applying an optimisation mindset to behavioural research and data, which has led me to explore natural language processing and understanding. As my research continues, I hope to include more techniques that bridge the Operations Research and Computational Social Sciences domains.

Collaboration

I am always interested in hearing from researchers working in related areas, particularly within natural language processing, sentiment and affect diffusion in online networks, agent-based simulation of social systems, and machine learning applications. I am open to co-authorship, joint grant applications, and sharing of methods, models or datasets, and happy to discuss opportunities regardless of institution or location. If you think our work overlaps, get in touch with a short note on what you are working on. I am particularly keen to hear from anyone tackling information spread as it relates to mis- and disinformation, as I would like to explore the role of affective information in that research space.

Academic position

Lecturer Stellenbosch University · Department of Logistics · South Africa