Research Interests: Statistical Network Modeling, Social Network Analysis, Crime and Criminal Violence, International and Unauthorized Migration

As a sociologist, I have a broad substantive interest in examining patterns of criminal behavior and international migration. My dissertation examines the factors assocaited with (1) drug-trafficking related homicide rates in Mexico from 2010 to 2018, and (2) the temporal network structure of inter-cartel battles for territoral control. In addition, I am also interested in advancing methods for the analysis of social networks, especially methods for the analysis of two-mode networks (e.g., brokerage).

At the intersection of my substantive interests, my recent publication in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies examined the social process of coyotaje at U.S.-Mexico Border from 1994 to 2010 to understand how past migratory experiences can reduce the uncertainty of the illicit market of coyotes for autonomous migrants, given the increasing militarization of the U.S.-Mexico border.

I am a strong advocate for open science. In particular, as a proponent of open science, I 1) make all code for replicating analyses from my peer-reviewed articles publicly available, and 2) actively work on developing functions for the free and open-access statistical software R (i.e., the dream and netpanel R packages).

Feel free to reach me directly at kacarson@arizona.edu.