Congrats to CCL members Annie Waldherr, Hajo Boomgarden, Aytalina Kulichkina and Jula Lühring for joining the WHAT-IF project and bringing in their expertise in social simulations to develop policy interventions for a healthier digital political information environment. 

Over the next several years, the WHAT-IF team will employ panel surveys, social media data donations, and immersive field experiments to simulate the political information landscape in four European countries (Lithuania, the Netherlands, Romania, and Spain), testing the impact of policy interventions in a controlled simulation environment. Hosted by Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the two-day meeting laid the foundation for this ambitious initiative. Researchers mapped out the project’s roadmap, assessed key challenges, and pooled their interdisciplinary expertise to ensure a strong start.