Francesca Arcostanzo is a Senior Research Manager – Digital Methods Lead within ISD’s Digital Research Unit, working across a variety of research projects to ensure consistency in methods, training and approaches to digital analysis, and leading the ISD-CASM shared strategy for technological development. She has 7+ years of experience in digital research, with a focus on issue politicisation, digital polarisation and election campaigns. Her main areas of expertise are social media research methods, including content, text, network and statistical analysis of large-scale datasets.

She holds a PhD in public opinion, political communication and electoral behaviour from the University of Milan, a MA in Government and Public communication, and a MSc in Intelligence & ICT. In her PhD dissertation, she developed and tested a method to investigate the modes and extent of EU politicisation in national election campaigns relying on social media data. Prior to joining ISD, she was a Digital Communications Specialist in the Web and Digital Division of the European Central Bank, monitoring and analysing conversations, disinformation and threats around the ECB and its policies.