Abby Youran Qin, PhD (University of Wisconsin-Madison), is a postdoctoral researcher at the Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR), University of Amsterdam. Her research examines how journalism and information systems shape democratic life across three levels: individual lived experience, local information ecosystems, and institutional design.

At the individual level, she studies how people living in poverty and precarity encounter political communication and participate in — or withdraw from — civic life. At the community level, she analyzes how contextual features — local information infrastructure and partisan media environments — structure the possibilities for civic expression, including voting and social movements. At the macro level, she conducts cross-national research on trust in journalism to examine how socioeconomic conditions, press freedom, and institutional reforms shape prospects for media credibility and inform strategies for journalistic repair.

Taken together, she seeks to offer a multi-level account of how information systems enable or constrain democratic participation.

Qin, Abby Youran, Xiao, Fan, & Dai, Linjie (2025). Tell China's conspiracy well: Networks and narratives of Anti-CCP YouTube influencers. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies. https://doi.org/10.1177/13548565251392612

Qin, Abby Youran (2024). Where is local news dying off? Mechanisms behind the formation of local news deserts in the U.S. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly. https://doi.org/10.1177/10776990241277885

Qin, Abby Youran (2023). Staying tuned for censored information sources? A media habit approach to immigrants’ information practices. International Journal of Communication, 17, 6764-6785. https://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/21139

Qin, Abby Youran (2022). Judging “them” by my media use: Exploring the cause and consequences of perceived selective exposure. Mass Communication and Society, 2(25), 237-259. https://doi.org/10.1080/15205436.2021.1977327

Qin Abby Youran (2025). Five key reasons your town lost its newspaper – but the town next door didn’t. The Conversation. (Also republished by Nieman Lab)

Qin Abby Youran (2025). Redrawing the bottom line: How FCC deregulation reshapes broadcast newsrooms. Center for Journalism Ethics.

Qin Abby Youran (2025). Why journalists should stop beating themselves up over audience engagement: A Q&A with Professor Jacob Nelson. Center for Journalism Ethics.

Qin Abby Youran (2025). It’s political, not medical: Rethinking coverage of political leaders’ health. Center for Journalism Ethics.

Qin Abby Youran (forthcoming). Ethical labor, broken institutions: Journalism and democracy amid financialization: A Q&A with Professor Margot Susca. Center for Journalism Ethics.