Dr Valeria Bodishtianu, Resident Fellow at UWA
UWA Business School, Economics
Bio
Dr Valeria Bodishtianu completed her undergraduate training in Applied Mathematics and Information Science in Russia, before undertaking a Master of Economics at the New Economic School in Moscow (2017–2019).
She then moved to the United States to pursue a PhD in Economics at Cornell University (2019–2025). Her doctoral research examined political polarisation, information sharing, and belief formation, drawing on game theory and network economics to understand how strategic interaction and information structures shape behaviour.
In 2025, Dr Bodishtianu joined The University of Western Australia as a Lecturer in the Department of Economics within the UWA Business School. At UWA, her work focuses on information economics, networks, and political economy, including research on political polarisation, the spread of misinformation, and the behaviour of artificial intelligence systems in strategic and economic environments. Alongside her research, she teaches in microeconomics, game theory, and political economy.
Academic Focus
Dr Bodishtianu is a Lecturer in Economics at UWA whose research explores how beliefs and behaviour evolve in digital environments. Her work examines the role of information, strategic interaction and AI-driven influence in shaping societal outcomes, including political polarisation and the spread of misinformation across social networks.
Research Summary
Dr Bodishtianu’s research interests focus on how information, influence, and decision-making unfold in social and economic environments, particularly at the intersection of beliefs, digital communication, and strategic interaction. Her work spans several related areas, including:
Information economics and political behaviour, examining motivations for fact-checking and how individuals assess the reliability of information in digital environments
Artificial intelligence and strategic interaction, studying how large language models make decisions in cooperative and bargaining settings and the economic implications of their behavioural patterns
Networked beliefs and social dynamics, investigating how beliefs spread, and sometimes polarise, through social networks, and how both human and AI-driven influence shape individual and collective behaviour
Game theory and behavioural foundations, exploring how strategic reasoning and interaction affect societal outcomes such as consensus, disagreement, and collective choice
Work and Education History
2025 – Present Lecturer, UWA Business School, Economics
2020 – 2025 Teaching Assistant, Department of Economics, Cornell University, Ithaca, USA
2019 – 2025 PhD in Economics, Department of Economics, Cornell University, Ithaca, USA
2017 – 2019 Master of Arts in Economics, New Economic School, Moscow, Russia
2016 Research Intern, Hydrometeorological Centre of Russia, Moscow, Russia
2015 Research Intern, Sberbank CIB, Moscow, Russia
2013 – 2017 Bachelor of Applied Mathematics and Information Science, Faculty of Computer Science, Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia