HSS Celebrates Its Newest PhD Alumni – Class of 2025

On the occasion of Caltech's 131st commencement ceremony, the Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences proudly presents another outstanding group of graduate students – six earning PhDs in Social Sciences and three in Social and Decision Neurosciences. Please join us in wishing our latest alumni and the entire class of 2025 well in their future endeavors!

Polina Detkova graduates this month after defending her thesis, Essays in Experimental Economics, with Marina Agranov as her advisor. During her time with HSS, she received the Linde Institute Graduate Fellowship in 2021–2022 and the Lance E. Davis Graduate Fellowship in 2024–2025. This summer, she begins her new role as a postdoctoral research assistant in the department of economics at Royal Holloway, University of London.

After defending his dissertation, Core Reinforcement Learning Computations Underlying Distinct Behavioral Strategies and Their Implications in Psychiatry, in November 2024 with John O'Doherty as his advisor, Weilun Ding remained with the O'Doherty Lab as a postdoctoral scholar research associate in social and decision neuroscience.

Peter Doe is a microeconomic theorist specializing in algorithmic market design. He receives his PhD this month after defending his thesis, Essays in Matching Theory, with Luciano Pomatto and Federico Echenique as his advisors. Doe, the Stephen A. Ross Memorial Fellowship recipient (2024–2025), joins Hope College as an assistant professor of economics this fall.

Brenden Eum is now a postdoctoral fellow in marketing at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management, following the defense of his thesis, Essays on Sequential Sampling in Value-Based Choice. Eum received an HSS Brass Division Award in 2021 for his role as a graduate teaching assistant. He was advised by Antonio Rangel and received a Chen Graduate Fellowship (2019–2020) and the A. Michael and Ruth C. Lipper Graduate Fellowship (2023–2024).

Kexin Feng defended her dissertation, Tensions, Trade, and Transformation: Essays on Chinese Economic History During the Warlord Era, with Jean-Laurent Rosenthal as her advisor. She was the Repetto-Figueroa Family Graduate Fellow (2021–2022 and 2024–2025) and the James and Karen Gerard Fellow in Social Sciences (2023–2024). She also received the 2025 Eleanor Searle Prize in Law, Politics, and Institutions. Feng joins Yale University's Economic Growth Center as a postdoctoral associate this fall.

Jacob Morrier is a data and quantitative social scientist with expertise in applying sophisticated quantitative methodologies. He earned his PhD after defending his thesis, Essays on Political Accountability and Representation, with Michael Alvarez as his advisor. After graduation, Morrier will begin his role as an associate at Analysis Group, an economic consulting firm in Los Angeles.

Ke Shi graduates this month after defending his dissertation, Essays in Empirical Industrial Organization and Corporate Finance, with Jean-Laurent Rosenthal as his advisor. He received the James and Karen Gerard Fellowship in Social Sciences (2021–2022) and the Clarence J. Hicks Memorial Fellowship (2024–2025). He also received the 2022 John O. Ledyard Prize for Graduate Research in Social Science for his paper titled "Venture Capital: A Tale of Three Networks." This fall, Shi will join the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance at Shanghai Jiao Tong University as an assistant professor of finance.

As a graduate student in HSS, Fan Wu received the Roger and Marjorie Davisson Graduate Fellowship (2024–2025), and he pursued research interests in microeconomic theory, particularly information acquisition, information design, and mechanism design. He earns his PhD after completing his dissertation, Essays on Information Economics, with Omer Tamuz as his advisor. Wu will continue his academic career as an assistant professor at Peking University's HSBC Business School.

Sanghyun Yi defended his thesis, Neurocomputational Understanding of Decision-Making in Novel Environments, in September 2024 with John O'Doherty as his advisor. The former Chen Graduate Fellow (2018–2019) spent the last year as an applied scientist intern with Amazon Web Services, and he recently joined a stealth AI startup.

Read about these students and our departing postdoctoral fellows and instructors in the 2024–2025 Next Steps publication.