Chris Danforth

Professor, Department of Mathematics & Statistics

Co-Director, Computational Story Lab

Associate Director, Vermont Complex Systems Institute, University of Vermont

Director, Vermont Advanced Computing Center

Stacks Image 414798_414995
Stacks Image 414981
Stacks Image 414983
Stacks Image 415013
Stacks Image 415038
Stacks Image 415045
Stacks Image 415031

Research

Stacks Image 499349

Lived Experiences Measured Using Rings Study (LEMURS)

Science of Online Corpora, Knowledge, and Stories (SOCKS)

Recent funding from NSF for science, MRI for GPUs and RAM, & MassMutual

“Inside the lab that’s quantifying happiness”
Profile of our research group in Outside Magazine

Research team & group publications

"The essence of meaning aligns with a power-danger-structure framework" paper in Science Advances & press release

"The war in Ukraine has made Russian social-media users glum" The Economist

“Is Everybody Doing … OK? Let’s Ask Social Media”
Story on Hedonometer in New York Times

“Has Twitter just had its saddest fortnight ever?”
Story on Hedonometer in Nature

"Storywrangler: A massive exploratorium for sociolinguistic, cultural, socioeconomic, and political timelines using Twitter" Paper in Science Advances

“Instagram photos reveal predictive markers of depression”
Paper in EPJ Data Science, coverage by New York Times

“The emotional arcs of stories are dominated by six basic shapes” Paper in EPJ Data Science, coverage by The Atlantic

“Human language reveals a universal positivity bias”
Paper in PNAS, coverage by New York Times

Stacks Image 499462

Hedonometer: a population scale measure of daily happiness

Stacks Image 500327

StoryWrangler: A visual comparison of phrase popularity in 150 billion tweets

Stacks Image 505955

WikiWrangler: Measuring Global Collective Attention on Wikipedia

Recent Publications

  • 149. False memories to fake news: The evolution of the term "misinformation" in academic literature.
    A. J. R. Iglesias, D. Benett, J. W. Zimmerman, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507168
  • 148. Narrative Structure in Tropes: A Computational Analysis of 'Friends'.
    S. Zhang, T. T. Prama, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507177
  • 147. Archetypes and gender in fiction: A data-driven mapping of gender stereotypes in stories.
    C. G. Beauregard, J. W. Zimmerman, A. M. Fehr, T. R. Tangherlini, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507186
  • 146. Probability-turbulence divergence: A tunable allotaxonometric instrument for comparing heavy-tailed type-probability distributions.
    P. S. Dodds, J. R. Minot, M. V. Arnold, T. Alshaabi, J. L. Adams, A. J. Reagan, C. M. Danforth.
    PLOS Complex Systems. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url] [online appendix] [thread]
    Stacks Image 507446
  • 145. Sensitivity analysis of epidemic forecasting and spreading on networks with probability generating functions.
    M. C. Boudreau, W. H. W. Thompson, C. M. Danforth, J.-G. Young, L. Hébert-Dufresne
    Journal of the Royal Society Interface. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url]
    Stacks Image 507455
  • 144. Statistical laws and linguistics inform meaning in naturalistic and fictional conversation.
    A. M. A. Fehr, C. G. Beauregard, J. W. Zimmerman, K. Ekstrom, P. Rosillo-Rodes, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507464
  • 143. Tokens, the oft-overlooked appetizer: Large language models, the distributional hypothesis, and meaning.
    J. W. Zimmerman, D. Hudon, K. Cramer, A. J. Ruiz, C. Beauregard, A. Fehr, M. I. Fudolig, B. Demarest, Y. M. Bird, M. Z. Trujillo, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507473
  • 142. Gender Disparities in LLM-Based Intimate Partner Violence Detection.
    T. T. Prama, M. I. Fudolig, A. M Crocker, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    Proceedings of the ACL workshop on NLP & Computational Social Science. In Press. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507482
  • 141. Translation-CoT: A Human-Inspired Chain-of-Thought Framework for Multilingual LLM Translation
    T. T. Prama, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    Association for Machine Translation in the Americas (AMTA) Conference Proceedings. In Press. 2026.
    Stacks Image 507491
  • 140. Global brain drain and gain in high-potential student mobility.
    T. T. Prama, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507500
  • 139. Story and essential meaning dynamics in Bangladesh’s July 2024 Student-People’s Uprising.
    T. T. Prama, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507509
  • 138. Us-vs-Them bias in Large Language Models.
    T. T. Prama, J. W. Zimmerman. C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507518
  • 137. Misalignment of LLM-Generated Personas with Human Perceptions in Low-Resource Settings.
    T. T. Prama, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507527
  • 136. Detecting sub-populations in online health communities: A mixed-methods exploration of breastfeeding messages in BabyCenter Birth Clubs.
    C. Beauregard, P. Suchdev, A. M. A. Fehr, I. T. Smith, T. T. Prama, J. W. Zimmerman, C. Ward, J. Lovato, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507536
  • 135. Ousiometrics: Essential meaning aligns with a
    Power–Danger–Structure framework instead of Valence–Arousal–Dominance, and diverse corpora reveal a universal safety bias.
    P. S. Dodds, T. Alshaabi, M. I. Fudolig, J. W. Zimmerman, J. Lovato, S. Beaulieu, J. R. Minot, M. V. Arnold, A. J. Reagan, C. M. Danforth.
    Science Advances. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url] [online appendix] [thread] [press]
    Stacks Image 507545
  • 134. A Formative Study of Brief Affective Text as a Complement to Wearable Sensing for Longitudinal Student Health Monitoring.
    T. Harry, J. Hidalgo, M. Price, Y. Feng, K. Stanton, C. Tompkins, P. S. Dodds, M. Fudolig, L. Bloomfield, C. M. Danforth.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507554
  • 133. Taste for Privacy: How Context, Identity, and Lived-Experience Shape Information Sharing Preferences.
    J. Lovato, L. Hébert-Dufresne, M. Ghasemizade, J. St-Onge, P. S. Dodds, L. S. P. Bloomfield, M. I. Fudolig, M. Price, C. M. Danforth.
    ACM Conference on Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency (FAccT). 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url]
    Stacks Image 507563
  • 132. Exploration of wearable sensor measures associated with panic attacks differs across mental health conditions.
    D. D. Kairamkonda, E. W. McGinnis, M. Price, J. E. Hidalgo, J. Kim, J. Llorin, K. Stanton, L. S. P. Bloomfield, M. I. Fudolig, J. Ha, N. Noble, J. Cherian, G. Mascia, N. S. O'Connell, J. Fanning, P. S. Dodds, C. M. Danforth, R. S. McGinnis.
    Frontiers in Digital Health. 2026.
    [pdf] [journal url]
    Stacks Image 507574
  • 131. Personalized Machine Learning Models for Predicting Panic Attacks.
    D. D. Kairamkonda, E. W. McGinnis, J. Cherian, G. Mascia, M. Price, J. E. Hidalgo, J. Kim, J. Llorin, K. Stanton, J. Ha, P. S. Dodds, C. M. Danforth, R. S. McGinnis.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507583
  • 130. Aim High, Stay Private: Differentially Private Synthetic Data Enables Public Release of Behavioral Health Information with High Utility.
    M. Ghasemizade, J. Lovato, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds, L. S. P. Bloomfield, M. Price, Team LEMURS, J. P. Near.
    Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association (JAMIA) Open. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url] [code]
    Stacks Image 507592
  • 129. Identifying Body Composition Measures That Correlate with Self-Compassion and Social Support.
    E. Poon, M. I. Fudolig, J. E. Hidalgo, B. C. Loftness, K. Stanton, C. L. Tompkins, L. S. P. Bloomfield, M. Price, P. S. Dodds, C. M. Danforth, N. Cheney.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507601
  • 128. Spatial Patterns and Temporal Trends of Nature Exposure in a College Student Cohort.
    L. S. P. Bloomfield, S. Lombardo, M. Price, T. H. Ricketts, C. M. Danforth.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507610
  • 127. Perceived and quantified nature exposure in relation to mental health.
    L. S. P. Bloomfield, S. Lombardo, M. Price, T. H. Ricketts, C. M. Danforth.
    Health & Place. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url]
    Stacks Image 507619
  • 126. Effects of behavioral interventions on psychological and biometric measures of well-being in young adults: results of a 14-week, four-arm, randomized, controlled trial.
    L. S. P. Bloomfield, M. I. Fudolig, J. Kim, J. Llorin, J. L. Lovato, E. W. McGinnis, R. S. McGinnis, M. Price, T. H. Ricketts, P. S. Dodds, K. Stanton, C. M. Danforth.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507628
  • 125. Discovering Digital Biomarkers of Panic Attack Risk in Consumer Wearables Data.
    E. W. McGinnis, S. Lunna, I. Berman, B. Loftness, S. Bagdon, C. M. Danforth, M. Price, W. E. Copeland, R. S. McGinnis.
    In Review. 2026.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507637
  • 124. Objective Physical Activity Patterns Of College Students Throughout The Academic Year.
    C. L. Tompkins, M. Price, J. E. Hidalgo, N. Noble, J. Ha, L. S. P. Bloomfield, P. S. Dodds, M. I. Fudolig, M. Hickok, J. Kim, J. Llorin, J. Lovato, E. W. McGinnis, R. S. McGinnis, K. Stanton, T. H. Ricketts, C. M. Danforth.
    Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise. 2025.
    [journal url]
    Stacks Image 507646
  • 123. Collective sleep and activity patterns of college students from wearable devices.
    M. I. Fudolig, L. S. P. Bloomfield, M. Price, Y. M. Bird, J. E. Hidalgo, J. Kim, J. Llorin, J. L. Lovato, E. W. McGinnis, R. S. McGinnis, T. H. Ricketts, K. Stanton, P. S. Dodds, C. M. Danforth.
    npj Complexity. 2025.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url]
    Stacks Image 507657
  • 122. Hollywood’s misrepresentation of death: A comparison of overall and by-gender mortality causes in film and the real world.
    C. Beauregard, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR) Formative Research. 2025.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url]
    Stacks Image 507666
  • 121. LLMs for Low-Resource Dialect Translation Using Context-Aware Prompting: A Case Study on Sylheti.
    T. T. Prama, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    Proceedings of the Second Workshop on Bangla Language Processing. 2025.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url]
    Stacks Image 507675
  • 120. BanglaMATH: A Bangla benchmark dataset for testing LLM mathematical reasoning at grades 6, 7, and 8.
    T. T. Prama, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    Proceedings of The 3rd Workshop on Mathematical Natural Language Processing (MathNLP 2025). 2025.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url]
    Stacks Image 507684
  • 119. HateSense: A Multi-Task Learning Framework for Comprehensive Hate Speech Identification using LLMs.
    T. T. Prama, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    Proceedings of the Second Workshop on Bangla Language Processing. 2025.
    [pdf] [journal url]
    Stacks Image 507693
  • 118. An assessment of measuring local levels of homelessness through proxy social media signals.
    Y. M. Bird, S. E. Grobe, M. V. Arnold, S. P. Rogers, M. I. Fudolig, J. W. Zimmerman, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    International Journal on Homelessness. 2025.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [journal url] [thread] [press]
    Stacks Image 507702
  • 117. A quantitative analysis of the affirmative furtherance of fair housing in the Housing Choice Voucher program.
    Y. M. Bird, A. Fehr, J. W. Zimmerman, M. I. Fudolig, S. E. Grobe, M. V. Arnold, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds.
    arXiv.org 2025.
    [pdf] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507711
  • 116. A suite of allotaxonometric tools for the comparison of complex systems using rank-turbulence divergence.
    J. St-Onge, A. M. A. Fehr, C. Ward, C. G. Beauregard, M. V. Arnold, S. F. Rosenblatt, B. Cooley, C. M. Danforth, P. S. Dodds
    arXiv.org 2025.
    [pdf] [arXiv] [online appendix]
    Stacks Image 507720
  • 115. Archetypometrics, a Pragmateia: Empirical Determination of the Fundamental Archetypes of Fictional Characters.
    P. S. Dodds, J. W. Zimmerman, C. G. Beauregard, A. M. Fehr, M. Fudolig, T. Tangherlini, C. M. Danforth.
    arXiv.org 2025.
    [pdf (1.6GB)] [arXiv]
    Stacks Image 507729

Full publication list

Teaching

Video lectures for recent course on Nonlinear Dynamics available for free on YouTube

2022 Kroepsch-Maurice Excellence in Teaching Award

Applied Mathematics classes taught at UVM include Linear Algebra, Numerical Analysis, Nonlinear Dynamics, Ordinary Differential Equations, and Data Ethics

We now offer an undergraduate degree in Data Science, as well as both MS and PhD degrees in Complex Systems & Data Science

Stacks Image 499363

Tweets