Kalin (McKenzie) Bennett

Areas of interest: African American politics, political psychology, public opinion, political behavior, voting behavior

Kalin (McKenzie) Bennett is a third-year Ph.D. candidate in Political Science at the University of Notre Dame. Her research focuses on intergroup attitudes, ethnocentrism, social justice movements, political psychology and the principle-policy gap.

Bennett's research focuses on White allyship, specifically examining predispositions and the crystallization of attitudes into behavioral manifestations. Her ongoing projects delve into establishing causal links between cognitive orientations and observable behavioral aspects of White allyship. Furthermore, she investigates the impact of performative allyship on social justice objectives and goals.

She graduated with summa cum laude honors upon completing her BA degree in Political Science with a minor in Psychology. Additionally, Bennett is a scholar from the Ronald E. McNair Post-Baccalaureate Achievement Program. In 2021, she was honored with the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship.