Research
Current projects
Publications
Publications in Refereed Journals
- Wendering, L., Ratkovic, M., Gschwend, T., Schoenenberger, H. und Scaplehorn, N. (2025). Lessons from an AI-Sprint: a proposal for measuring human-AI cooperation in research. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, 12, 1–4.
- Ratkovic, M. (2023). Relaxing assumptions, improving inference: Integrating machine learning and the linear regression. American Political Science Review, 117, 1053-1069.
- Ratkovic, M. und Tingley, D. (2023). Estimation and inference on nonlinear and heterogeneous effects. The Journal of Politics : JOP, 85, 421–435.
- Enamorado, T., López-Moctezuma, G. und Ratkovic, M. (2021). Scaling data from multiple sources. Political Analysis : PA, 29, 212–235.
- Kim, I. S., Londregan, J. und Ratkovic, M. (2019). The effects of political institutions on the extensive and intensive margins of trade. International Organization : IO, 73, 755–792.
- Kim, I. S., Londregan, J. und Ratkovic, M. (2018). Estimating spatial preferences from votes and text. Political Analysis : PA, 26, 210–229.
- Ratkovic, M. und Tingley, D. (2017). Sparse estimation and uncertainty with application to subgroup analysis. Political Analysis : PA, 25, 1–40.
- Imai, K. und Ratkovic, M. (2015). Robust estimation of inverse probability weights for marginal structural models. Journal of the American Statistical Association : JASA, 110, 1013-1023.
- Imai, K. und Ratkovic, M. (2014). Covariate balancing propensity score. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society. Series B, Statistical Methodolgy, 76, 243–263.
- Imai, K. und Ratkovic, M. (2013). Estimating treatment effect heterogeneity in randomized program evaluation. The Annals of Applied Statistics, 7, 443–470.
- Ratkovic, M. und Eng, K. H. (2010). Finding jumps in otherwise smooth curves: Identifying critical events in political processes. Political Analysis : PA, 18, 57–77.
Chapters in Edited Volumes
- Ratkovic, M. (2021). Subgroup analysis: Pitfalls, promise, and honesty. In , Advances in experimental political science (S. 271–288). , Cambridge University Press: Cambridge [u. a.].
Pre-Print Articles
- Ratkovic, M. and Gschwend, T. and Wendering, L. and Bauer, K. and Kurella, A.-S. and Rittmann, O. and Sauter, M. and Schwitter, N., Harnessing GPT for Enhanced Academic Writing: Evidence from a Field Experiment with Early-Career Researchers in the Social Sciences (June 20, 2025). Available at SSRN here or here.
Working Papers
- “Improving Variable Importance Measures.” With Zenobia Chan.
- “Sparse Multilevel Regression and Poststratification.” With Max Goplerud, Shiro Kuriwaki, and Dustin Tingley.
- “Bicoordinate Descent for the LASSO.” With In Song Kim and John Londregan.
Published Software
- “PLCE: R package for Semiparametrically Efficient Causal Effect Estimation with Binary and Continuous Treatment Variables.” Available through the Comprehensive R Archive Network.
- “sparsereg: R package for Sparse Bayesian Models for Regression, Subgroup Analysis, and Panel Data.” With Dustin Tingley. Available through the Comprehensive R Archive Network.
- “CBPS: R Package for Covariate Balancing Propensity Score.” With Kosuke Imai and Christian Fong. Available through the Comprehensive R Archive Network.
- “FindIt: R Package for Estimating Heterogeneous Treatment Effects.” With Kosuke Imai. Available through the Comprehensive R Archive Network.
Grants and Awards
- Minerva Research Initiative Grant. “Reforging Identity: Comparative Ethnographic Studies of Influence Operations in Taiwan and Estonia.” $852,031.
- Stanley Kelley, Jr. Award for Excellence in Teaching. Department of Politics, Princeton University. May 12, 2021.
- Gosnell Prize for Excellence in Political Methodology, for “Sparse Estimation with Uncertainty: Subgroup Analysis in Large Dimensional Designs.” With Dustin Tingley. July 22, 2016.
- Thomas R. Ten Have Memorial Award for Best Poster, for “Identification of Treatment Effect Heterogeneity as a Variable Selection Problem.” With Kosuke Imai. Atlantic Causal Inference Conference, Ann Arbor. May 20, 2011.
- Nomination for Best Paper, for “Identification of Treatment Effect Heterogeneity as a Variable Selection Problem.” With Kosuke Imai. Annual Midwest Political Science Association Meeting, Chicago. April 1, 2011.
- Department of Political Science Teaching Award. University of Wisconsin-Madison. Fall, 2007.
Invited External Speakers
- Sebastian Katthöver (Head of Audience Development, Editorial AI & Lab, Deutsche Welle): „Use of AI Tool in Newsrooms.“ Talk and Discussion at the closing event of the DS601 class. (May 22, 2026)
- Dr. Swapneel Mehta (SimPPL): „Arbiter: Improving Digital Safety with AI Agents.“ Talk and Discussion at the closing event of the DS202 class. (January 30, 2026)
- Christopher Klamm (University of Cologne and University of Mannheim): „AI Conversational Interviewing: Transforming Surveys with LLMs as Adaptive Interviewers." Talk and Discussion within the Lecture Series within the DS202 class. (December 2, 2025)
- Hubert Plisiecki (SWPS University; Polish Academy of Sciences): "Measuring Individual Differences in Meaning: The Supervised Semantic Differential.“ Talk and Discussion within the Lecture Series within the DS202 class. (November 18, 2025)
- Prof. Dustin Tingley (Harvard University): "Climate Policy and Energy Transition Tradeoffs: Local Economies and Global Contexts.“, Talk open to the General Public. (October 30, 2025)
- Prof. Dustin Tingley (Harvard University): "Why Clean Energy Investments Had Limited Political Returns.“ Talk and Discussion within the Lecture Series within the DS202 class. (October 28, 2025)
- Prof. Dustin Tingley (Harvard University): "Who Gets Credit for Green Industrial Policy?“ Talk in the MZES Speaker Series. (October 28, 2025)
- Dr. Oliver Rittmann (MZES, University of Mannheim): "Dilemmas of parliamentary deliberation: Insights from an automated analysis of plenary video footage.“ Talk and Discussion within the Lecture Series within the DS202 class. (October 7, 2025)
- Andreas Küpfer (TU Darmstadt): "A Pipeline for Extracting Data from Complex Political Events.“ Talk and Discussion within the Lecture Series within the DS202 class. (September 30, 2025)
- Prof. Benjamin Johnson (University of Florida): "Taking Justices’ Legal Preferences Seriously (And Locating Opinions in Policy Space).“ Talk and Discussion within the Lecture Series within the DS202 class. (September 23, 2025)
- Prof. Kosuke Imai (Harvard University): "Does AI help humans make better decisions?“ Distinguished Lecture at the Mannheim Center for Data Science. (March 4, 2025)
Invited Talks
- „Harnessing GPT for Enhanced Academic Writing: Evidence from a Field Experiment with Early-Career Researchers in the Social Sciences.“ Invited talk in the MZES Social Science Data Lab Colloquium, organised by The Mannheim Centre for European Social Research (MZES) at the University of Mannheim, Mannheim / Germany. YouTube (live & recorded on September 16, 2026)
- „Large Language Models for Statistical Inference: Context Augmentation with Applications to the Two-Sample Problem and Regression.“ ICSTA Keynote Lecture at the 8th International Conference on Statistics: Theory and Applications (ICSTA 2026), London / United Kingdom. (August 18, 2026)
- „Text as a Random Variable: Linguistic Theory, Fisher Geometry, and More Powerful Tests.“ Invited talk at the event Academic Speed Dating Spring Semester 2026 – Experiments and Causal Research with AI, organised by the Mannheim Center for Data Science (MCDS) at the University of Mynnheim, Mannheim / Germany. (April 16, 2026)
- „The current situation in the United States of America.“ Invited talk organized by the General Student Committee (AStA) of the University of Mannheim, Mannheim / Germany. (March 10, 2026)
- "Targeted Behavioral Risk Intelligence: Early Detection and Intervention on Radicalization.“ NATO Innovation Continuum 2026 SPARK Event, Sofia / Bulgaria. (February 24–26, 2026)
- „Large Language Models for Statistical Inference: Context Augmentation with Applications to the Two-Sample Problem and Regression.“ Invited Talk within the Departmental Speaker Seminar series of the Department of Statistics at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Munich / Germany. (February 04, 2026)
- „Large Language Models for Statistical Inference: Context Augmentation with Applications to the Two-Sample and Regression Problems.“ EPSA 2025, Madrid / Spain. (June 26–28, 2025)
- “Academic Writing: A Field Experiment Testing GPT's Ability to Foster Clarity and Efficiency.” University:Future Festival 2025, Berlin, Braunschweig, Nürnberg / Germany, Graz / Austria, Zurich / Switzerland and online (hybrid conference). YouTube (digital live & recorded on May 14, 2025)
- “Using LLMs for Regression and ANOVA: Statistical Inference and Testing of Text Data with Large Language Models.” With Haoyu Zhai. 7th International and Interdisciplinary Conference on the Quantitative and Computational Analysis of Textual Data (COMPTEXT), Vienna / Austria. (April 26, 2025)
- „Large Language Models for Statistical Inference: Context Augmentation with Applications to the Two-Sample Problem and Regression.“ Polmeth Europe 2025, London / UK. (April 7, 2025)
- „Large Language Models for Statistical Inference: Context Augmentation with Applications to the Two-Sample Problem and Regression.“ Invited talk at the Aix-Marseille School of Economics, Marseille / France. (March 24, 2025)
- Invited speaker at the Panel discussion on the US elections organized by the student representatives of the Departments of Sociology and Political Science of the University of Mannheim, Mannheim / Germany. (October 22, 2024)
- Invited speaker at the plenary panel Community insights on AI readiness. STM Annual Conference 2024 – Advancing trusted research in the AI era, Frankfurt a.M. / Germany. (October 14, 2024)
- “Context Augmentation for the Statistical Analysis of Text.“ With Haoyu Zhai. 6th International and Interdisciplinary Conference on the Quantitative and Computational Analysis of Textual Data (COMPTEXT), Amsterdam / Netherlands. (May 4, 2024)
- “Estimation and Inference on Nonlinear and Heterogeneous Effects.” International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML). With Dustin Tingley. Virtual conference. (September 10, 2021)
- “Rehabilitating the Regression: Honest and Valid Causal Inference through Machine Learning.” University of Michigan ISQM Seminar, Ann Arbor, MI / U.S.A. (November 4, 2019)
- “Rehabilitating the Regression: Honest and Valid Causal Inference through Machine Learning.” New York University Methods Seminar, New York, NY / U.S.A. (October 28, 2019)
- “Rehabilitating the Regression: Honest and Valid Causal Inference through Machine Learning.” Duke University Methods Seminar, Durham, NC / U.S.A. (May 13, 2019)
- “The Effects of Political Institutions on the Extensive and Intensive Margins of Trade.” V-Dem Institute, Gothenburg / Sweden. (May 20, 2018)
- “Causal Inference through the Method of Direct Estimation.” Ulric B. and Evelyn L. Bray Social Science Seminar Series, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA / U.S.A. (February 26, 2018)
- “Causal Inference through the Method of Direct Estimation.” Yale Methods Seminar, Yale University, New Haven, CT / U.S.A. (March 8, 2017)
- “Causal Inference through the Method of Direct Estimation.” IQSS, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA / U.S.A. (April 27, 2017)
- „What If? Machine Learning for Causal Inference.“ Harvard University and MIT, Cambridge, MA / U.S.A. (February 2016)
- „A Sparse Decomposition of Democracy and Trade“. Panel discussion, Annual Summer Meeting, Society for Political Methodology, University of Georgia, Athens, GA / U.S.A. (July 26, 2014)
- Summer School in Quantitative Methods, Empirical Political Economy Network. CIDE, Mexico City / Mexico. (May 19–20, 2014)
- „Covariate Balancing Propensity Score.“ Panel discussion, Annual Meeting of the Society for Political Methodology. University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC / U.S.A. (July 19, 2012)
- Machine Learning Seminar. Department of Computer Science, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ / U.S.A. (March 14, 2012)
- „Achieving Optimal Covariate Balance Under General Treamtent Regimes.“ Thomas R. Ten Have Memorial Presentation. Atlantic Causal Inference Conference, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD / U.S.A. (May 25, 2012)
- Experiments Seminar. Institution for Social and Policy Studies, Yale University, New Haven, CT / U.S.A. (September 8, 2011)
- „Achieving Optimal Covariate Balance Under General Treatment Regimes.“ Annual Meeting of the Society for Political Methodology. Princeton University, Princeton, NJ / U.S.A. (July 29, 2011)
- Annual Meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association. Chicago, IL / U.S.A. (April 1, 2011)
- „Identifying the Effects of Political Boundaries: Simultaneous Variable Selection and Curve Fitting through Mixed-Penalty Regularization.“ New Faces in Political Methodology Conference. Quantitative Social Science Initiative, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA /U.S.A. (May 1, 2010)
Press & Media Covereage
- SWR Aktuell Baden-Württemberg, – tv report and interview with Prof. Ratkovic and Dr. Abdul Rahman on academic freedom and research excellence. (German daily tv news magazine, broadcast and online May 26, 2026, 19:30)
- Tagesspiegel: „Computer, schreib mir meine Forschungsarbeit!: Wie hilfreich KI sein kann und wobei sie schadet“ – newspaper article discussing some of the results of the project as well as perspectives by Prof. Ratkovic and other experts in the field. (online June 23, 2025 / print edition June 24, 2025)
- Der Wiarda Blog: „KI verändert schon jetzt, wie wir denken“ – blog article discussing some of the results of the project as well as perspectives by Prof. Ratkovic and other experts in the field. (June 23, 2025)
- DUZ – Magazin für Wissenschaft und Gesellschaft: „Werkzeuge sind da, um benutzt zu werden“ – magazine interview with Prof. Ratkovic and Henning Schoenenberger (Springer Nature). (November 15, 2024)
- Mannheimer Morgen: " Mit der KI zur anerkannten Veröffentlichung“ – news paper article about the hackathon event. (September 24, 2024)