Alian Kasabian

Alian Kasabian

DIRECTOR OF MERC + RESEARCH AND DATA SECURITY LIAISON

Alian is a self-proclaimed data nerd, which comes from a lifetime of curiosity and the extensive training she received getting a PhD from UNL in Sociology with a minor in Survey Research and Methodology. Alian has worked for MERC since 2015 before becoming Assistant Director in 2018 and then Director in 2019. In this position, she provides oversight for the 45-60 active projects MERC has at any given time. Since taking on the role of Research and Data Security Liaison, Alian tries very hard to delegate as much as possible to her Associate Director and staff.

Alian is passionate about helping people understand data and use it responsibly. To these goals, she advocates for:

• Ethical data collection that meet the needs of the project and target population and reduces the burden on participants
• Reproducible and transparent data management practices
• Data sharing and security processes that protect the providers of the data
• Writing for a general audience

All of these continue to be a work in progress. Alian is also a member of the UNL Institutional Review Board, and is on the Metrics and Accountability Subcommittee for the Inclusion and Equity Committee of the American Association for Public Opinion Research.