Welcome!

You will find some details here about my research. Please get in touch!

About me

I am a doctoral candidate at the Central European University in Vienna, and a researcher in the ERC Project "MULTIREP" at the University of Vienna. I deal with questions in political behavior and psychology using experiments & other tools for causal inference. My published and on-going research investigates the activation, salience and representation of political and partisan group identities, and the limits of democratic accountability by citizens in questions such as political scandals, substance regulation or quality of democracy. When out of office, I am a serious hobby cyclist, and a nature and animal enthusiast.

Publications

Citizen accountability

Hamrak, B., Simonovits, G., Rusnak, A., & Szucs, F. (2024). Why Politicians Won’t Apologize: Communication Effects in the Aftermath of Sex Scandals. British Journal of Political Science. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007123424000292
Hamrak, B., Simonovits, G. & Szucs, F. (2024). Equilibrium communication in political scandals. European Journal of Political Economy. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2024.102580

Partisan and group identities, and polarization

Hamrak, B. (2025). Identity After the Ballot: How winning and losing impact partisan identity and affective polarization. Electoral Studies. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.electstud.2025.102967
Hamrak, B., Jenne, E., Littvay, L., & Simonovits, G. (forthcoming). The public opinion effects of antisemitic anti-elite cues. A sequential priming experiment on the Hungarian anti-Soros propaganda. East European Politics

Miscellaneous topics

Simonovits, G., Szucs, F., Hamrak, B., (2025). Door to door campaigns in an electoral autocracy: Evidence from Hungary. The Journal of Politics. https://doi.org/10.1086/735870

Research in-progress

Citizen accountability and representation:

Status quo bias and preferences for drug legalization: Evidence from a novel experimental approach (with Gabor Simonovits) Revise & resubmit
From Presidential Palace to Potholes: Does Female Leadership Spur Women’s Local Political Engagement? (with Daniel Kovarek)
Evaluating Democracy: Lay Perceptions vs. Experts Assessments in Hungary (with Alexander Bor)
How Identity Fragmentation Complicates Voter-Party Congruence (with Jozef Michal Mintal, Felix Butzlaff, Robert Vancel, Kamila Borsekova) Revise & resubmit

Partisan identity:

More Than a Game? A Multi-Event Regression Discontinuity Analysis on the Effect of Football on Out-Party Animosity
In-party favoritism or out-party threat? Testing the mechanisms behind citizens’ differential support for democratic norm violation in opposition and government (with Kata Moravecz, Mariyana Angelova, Levente Littvay, Jennifer McCoy, and Gabor Simonovits)