Matt Motta (PhD) is an Assistant Professor of Health Law, Policy, & Management at Boston University’s School of Public Health. His research aims to identify the social and political determinants of anti-science attitudes, and investigate their health policy impact. He also designs survey and field experiments that assess the effectiveness of health promotion messages on topics related to vaccination, mental health, climate change, and evidence-based health policy more broadly. As part of his research activities, he also conducts public health opinion research as a Research Fellow at the Policy Lab, and assesses the effectiveness of health promotion messaging as a Faculty Affiliate with The Center for Health Communication at Harvard’s TH Chan School of Public Health. Motta is the author of the book Anti-Scientific Americans, published with Oxford University Press (2024). In it, he offers a data-driven account of the prevalence, origins, and policy consequences of anti-intellectualism in American public life. His research has been featured in popular press outlets like The New York Times, NPR, The Washington Post, CBS News, and Scientific American, and has been published in academic journals across the social, medical, and environmental sciences.
