Narek Abelian

Graduate Affiliate

Narek is a PhD student in the Department of Political Science at Purdue University, studying Comparative Politics and Quantitative Methods. His research focuses on the integration of Artificial Intelligence and its impacts on democracies, as well as developing quantitative methods to better study these issues. At GRAIL, he works on the Political Deepfakes Incidents Database (PDID).

Narek is a PhD student in the Department of Political Science at Purdue University. He studies the intersection of AI and democratic backsliding. In particular, he is interested in AI's integration into backsliding cases, causing either further backsliding or improvements to democratic functions, as well as the surveillance capabilities of AI. Narek also has a substantial interest in quantitative methodology and how it could be utilized to further develop research capabilities in Political Science-adjacent fields. Narek holds a BA in Political Science and a minor in Business from California State University, Los Angeles, which he received in 2025.