@akbaritabar
Assistant Professor of Computational Social Science at the University of Rostock and @mpidr.bsky.social | Computational Social Science | Migration | Social Networks | Scientometrics | Sociology of Science | https://akbaritabar.github.io/
A week since the workshop launching Ben's UNIMAX group, I will not forget the optimism & enthusiasm filled the room in Blantyre, Malawi. Stay tuned for
-New opportunities w/Malawian admin data,
-New panel data of university graduates (first in Africa),
-Bilateral collaboration Global South & North!
Open Access Publication
Carrasco Armijo, J. I.; Akbaritabar, A.; Godin, M.; Vargas-Silva, C.:
Prioritizing global equity in migration research
Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, 1–28. (2025) doi.org/10.1057/s415...
Results are, epectedly, that "Countries with lower wealth and research allocation in GDP are less researched despite having larger immigration and emigration stocks."
Decolonising migration analysis? Still a long way to go.
Silhouettes of people in front of a world map, symbolizing the big gaps in migration research.
Large Gaps in Migration Research: Study reveals imbalanced coverage of global areas in migration research. Jose Ignacio Carrasco, Aliakbar Akbaritabar, Marie Godin & Carlos Vargas-Silva identified and analyzed about 125,000 migration-related publications.
www.demogr.mpg.de/go/GapsMigrationResearch
==> those lives without hesitation, as he did for 37 years. This is a win for humanity. This will hopefully mean fewer drones will be sent to bomb Ukraine. We should celebrate this victory and wish the best for the Iranian people as they move toward a free and democratic future.
It hurts to be completely disconnected from family and friends again since yesterday morning because the regime in Iran cut the internet.
On the positive side, there is now one less dictator in the world. Many lives will be saved now that he is dead. He would have taken ==>
📣Call for Applications‼️
ARTEMIS – African Research Talents Experiencing Mentoring In Science
📅Application Deadline: April 13, 2026.
👓Read all:
https://www.mpg.de/26122924/artemis-mentoring-programme
✍️Application:
https://www.mpg.de/26133233/MPG_ARTEMIS_2026_call-and-application-documents.pdf
🚨 A defining moment for global health data.
The termination of the #USAID-supported Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) Program has wide-ranging consequences. We reflect on the collapse and argue what should come next in a new PNAS: doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2…
📊 9,000+ studies
Join us in Bologna for the 1st meeting of the EAPS WG Open Science in Demography. Program: group intro + 2h workshop led by @jschoeley.com & @akbaritabar.bsky.social. Free & open to all. Register: eaps.opensci@gmail.com
#EPC2026 #OpenScience #Demography @eaps.bsky.social @populationeu.bsky.social
Job posting for a doctoral position at the University of Rostock and the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research.
Large-scale bibliometric data project to analyze and forecast the migration of scientists.
Research project on scientific mobility with a survey on the motivations and context of researchers and skilled workers.
Apply now! The application deadline is April 15, 2026. For more information, visit www.demogr.mpg.de/go/jobs.
Job Offer‼️Doctoral Student Position
Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (MPIDR) / University of Rostock
Supervisors: Aliakbar Akbaritabar | Emilio Zagheni
📆Apply until April 15, 2026
https://www.demogr.mpg.de/en/career_6122/jobs_fellowships_1910/doctoral_student_position_15039/
Highly recommended to apply to this doctoral position to contribute to the future of @smdatabase.bsky.social !
#BiblioDemography
Know a master graduate looking for a funded doctoral position? Please share this!
Come work with @ezagheni.bsky.social and me at @mpidr.bsky.social on topics related to migration of scholars and the highly-skilled.
More details:
www.demogr.mpg.de/en/career_61...
In “Limits of Predicting Individual-Level Longevity,” Badolato et al. assess a range of classic statistical & machine learning survival analysis models. @nickirons.bsky.social @monjalexander.bsky.social @ugobas.bsky.social @ezagheni.bsky.social @mpidr.bsky.social read.dukeupress.edu/demography/a...
Aliakbar Akbaritabar, Robin Haunschild, Lutz Bornmann: A study of gender and regional differences in scientific mobility and immobility among researchers identified as potentially talented in Journal of Informetrics (2025), DOI: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
This was a joyful collaboration with @rhaunschild.bsky.social and @lutzb.bsky.social
Call for applications: European Doctoral School of Demography (EDSD) 2026-2027
To be held at @mpidr.bsky.social and @sghwarsaweu.bsky.social
Application deadline: 27 March 2026 at 12 PM (noon)
Program start: 1 September 2026
Scholarships are available
Details: eaps.nl/edsd/how-to-...
Job opening for postdoctoral researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Demographic-Epidemiology.
The Medical Demography research group explains its goals for studying disease progression and its effects on health and the population.
We are looking for a PhD in demography, sociology, epidemiology, or related fields with experience in quantitative health data analysis.
Apply now: The application deadline is March 22, 2026. For more information, visit www.demogr.mpg.de/go/jobs.
📢Job Offer‼️New Max Planck Research Group on Medical Demography
Marcus Ebeling will lead the team starting on 1 July 2026. The research group will be based at the MPIDR in Rostock. Read an interview with Marcus on his future research here: www.demogr.mpg.de/go/rgmd (including link to job) #postdoc
P.S. 2: Please don't stop talking about Iran. The conditions of the Iranian people have not changed, even though life goes on elsewhere.
last summer's "Introduction to Computational Social Science," followed by the winter semester's "Computational Approaches to Migration Research." I am now starting to prepare for the next course in the upcoming summer semester, "Introduction to Demographic Methods."
Looking at this picture, can you guess the start and end dates of the academic semester in German academia?
Hint: They do not precisely match those of other countries or the calendar year!
P.S. 1: The picture shows two courses. The first was >>
Eine so klare und deutliche Botschaft wie diese von Merz über das iranische Regime habe ich noch nie gesehen! Eine großartige Nachricht!
www.berliner-zeitung.de/politik-gese...
📣 Our introduction to structural causal models in science studies is now published:
doi.org/10.1162/QSS....
@tklebel.bsky.social and I tried to make our introduction as accessible as possible. We illustrate the theory by three case studies based on a simulated model of Open Science. 🧵(1/6)
This semester I'm teaching demographic methods to sociology grad students and having a whale of a time. Here are the materials if people are interested (will be updated throughout the semester): github.com/MJAlexander/...
Graph from NetBlocks showing network connectivity in Iran from January 2, 2025, to January 20, 2025. The y-axis represents normalized connectivity, ranging from 0% to 100%, and the x-axis represents the dates. The green line representing Iran's connectivity remains lower than normal most of the time period due to protests, with a sharp drop on the evening of January 8. The drop in connectivity aligns with protests across the nation. The minimum and current connectivity levels are indicated as 1% and 1%, respectively. The chart has a dark background with a red horizontal arrow labeled 'SHUTDOWN', indicates the period of disruption.
⚠️ Update: With #Iran's internet blackout now past hour 280, the nation of over 90 million remains cut off for another day leaving friends and family unable to check in with loved ones. Meanwhile, traffic on select platforms points to an emergent strategy of whitelisting.
Graph from NetBlocks showing network connectivity in Iran from January 5, 2025, to January 10, 2025. The y-axis represents normalized connectivity, ranging from 0% to 100%, and the x-axis represents the dates. The green line representing Iran's connectivity remains lower than normal most of the time period due to protests, with a sharp drop on the evening of January 8. The drop in connectivity aligns with protests across the nation. The minimum and current connectivity levels are indicated as 1% and 1%, respectively. The chart has a dark background with a red horizontal arrow labeled 'SHUTDOWN', indicates the period of disruption.
⚠️ Update: It's now 8:00 am in #Iran where the sun is rising after another night of protests met with repression; metrics show the nationwide internet blackout remains in place at 36 hours, severely limiting Iranians' ability to check on the safety of friends and loved ones 📵
A second figure makes the authorship gap unmistakable: scholars affiliated with high-income institutions produce about 90% of research on their own contexts and also dominate research on countries in every other income group. Check the full paper here: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Our new paper examines over- and under-representation of countries in migration research across all scientific disciplines and the visuals tell the story. The global map highlights widespread imbalances: underrepresentation cuts across regions but falls most heavily on lower-income countries.
Sharing only name initials, as I do not have their consent to share names, but you know who you are! AM, AS, AW, BT, CB, DT, EGD, ER, GZ, HK, HS, JD, JH, JH, JMA, LA, MLP, MR, MA, RCK, SR, VL, VS. Thanks for the advice and tips on training, clothing, gears, etc.
It helps me stay positive, say more yeses, and maintain a “can do” attitude. It helps me achieve more, not less, as it helps me stay sane.
Here I would like to extend my heartfelt gratitude to all those who kept motivating me, among others and in alphabetical order.
“is this cost necessary? Don’t you have more important things to invest in?”
The 2025 lesson for me, after following seven months of structured training, was that yes, being physically active is a necessity. It is not a luxury.