Jennifer Kavanagh, M.A., Ph.D.

Jennifer Kavanagh (Ph.D., University of Michigan) is a political scientist at the RAND Corporation and associate director of the Strategy, Doctrine, and Resources Program in RAND's Arroyo Center. Her research focuses on U.S. political institutions and public opinion and their implications for U.S. foreign and domestic policy. She also studies defense strategy and planning, military force posture, and U.S. military interventions.

Her recent book, co-authored with RAND’s CEO Michael Rich, defines “Truth Decay” as the diminishing reliance on facts and data in U.S. political and civil discourse and describes its causes and consequences. Kavanagh is also a faculty member at the Pardee RAND Graduate School and has taught research methods courses as an adjunct professor at Georgetown and American University. While completing her Ph.D., she was a Department of Homeland Security Fellow and completed a research internship at Lawrence Livermore National Lab. Kavanagh graduated from Harvard University with a BA in Government and a minor in the Russian language.