Professional Awards
AAPOR Award for Exceptionally Distinguished Achievement
The AAPOR Award for Exceptionally Distinguished Achievement is the association’s lifetime achievement award and is given for an outstanding contribution to the field of public opinion research, including advances in theory, empirical research, and methods; improvements in ethical standards; and promotion of understanding among the public, media and/or policymakers.
We are pleased to announce the winner of this year’s AAPOR Award for Exceptionally Distinguished Achievement: Mollyann Brodie.
Mollyann Brodie is a scholar, a mentor, and a defining presence in public opinion research over the past three decades.
As Executive Director of Public Opinion and Survey Research at KFF, she has built a body of work that has become the nation’s definitive source for public opinion on health—earning the confidence of policymakers, journalists, and the public alike.
The world would simply know less about what Americans think, want, and experience in the healthcare system without her contributions.
Dr. Brodie’s work spans some of the most consequential health policy moments of recent decades. Under her direction, the KFF Health Tracking Poll documented the arc of the public’s opinions and experiences of the Affordable Care Act, providing an irreplaceable record of how sweeping legislation lands with ordinary Americans.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the KFF COVID-19 Vaccine Monitor became a critical resource for understanding the public’s views, access, uptake, and concerns about emerging vaccines. In each case, her vision produced research that went beyond poll numbers to tell the broader story of how Americans experienced major changes in health and health care.
Dr. Brodie’s career has been marked by a commitment to inclusion, both in her research and in her AAPOR service.
Under her leadership, KFF developed methodologically innovative surveys reaching immigrants, transgender adults, Hurricane Katrina evacuees, rural communities, and working-class Americans—populations whose voices too rarely appear in nationally representative data.
As AAPOR President in 2015–2016, she issued a call for greater diversity in the organization’s ranks and then did the hard work of following through, creating structures and pipelines that have since been institutionalized in AAPOR’s bylaws and infused in its culture.
Colleagues across the field attest to her generosity as a mentor: she has opened doors, made introductions, and invested in careers—particularly of women and people of color—with a consistency that has quietly shaped the composition of the profession.
AAPOR would not be the organization it is today without Molly’s contributions, and we are proud to honor her with the AAPOR Award for Exceptionally Distinguished Achievement.
AAPOR Book Award
The AAPOR Book Award seeks to recognize influential books that have stimulated theoretical and scientific research in public opinion and/or influenced our understanding or application of survey research methodology. Eligibility for the award includes any book in the field that is at least three years old (to allow time for books to be read and reviewed), including any published before or during the period covered by the list of the Fifty Books That Have Significantly Shaped Public Opinion Research 1946–1995.” (The books on the “Fifty Books” list have already been recognized by AAPOR and are not eligible for the annual book award.)
2026 Award Winner
What Goes Without Saying: Navigating Political Discussion in America
(2022, Cambridge University Press)
by Taylor N. Carlson and Jaime E. Settle
AAPOR Inclusive Voices Award
The AAPOR Inclusive Voices Award recognizes the important data sets, research, and survey methods that have improved the ability to study complex social phenomena related to understudied populations. The award will be presented to the scholars/researchers, organizations, or institutions who have produced the scholarship (including data collection, methodological approaches, or publications).
2026 Award Winner
KFF Surveys of Immigrants Project
Contributors: Shannon Schumacher, Liz Hamel, Samantha Artiga, Drishti Pillai, Ashley Kirzinger, Audrey Kearney, Marley Presiado, Isabelle Valdes, Julian Montalvo III, Mollyann Brodie (KFF); Eran Ben-Porath, Cameron McPhee, Emily Jennings, Payel Sen (SSRS); David Lauter (formerly LA Times); Ruth Igielnik, Will Davis (NY Times)
AAPOR Policy Impact Award
The AAPOR Policy Impact Award was developed to acknowledge that a key purpose of opinion and other survey research is to facilitate better-informed decisions. The award recognizes outstanding research that has had a clear impact on improving policy decisions, practice, and discourse—either in the public or private sectors.
2026 Award Winner
Annenberg Science and Public Health (ASAPH) Survey
Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania (APPC)
Contributors: Kathleen Hall Jamieson; Kenneth Winneg; Patrick Jamieson; Shawn Patterson; Laura A. Gibson; Dan Romer; Michael Rozansky
AAPOR Public Service Award
The AAPOR Public Service Award is intended to recognize and honor outstanding public service and dedication to maintaining AAPOR standards. It recognizes persons who work on behalf of the public sector and have contributed to the quality of government surveys, data systems, research, leadership, and/or policy.
2026 Award Winner
Diane Willimack
Retired, National Agricultural Statistical Service & Census Bureau
The Burns “Bud” Roper Fellow Award
This award is intended to help people working in survey research or public opinion research who are in the early stages of their careers attend the AAPOR Annual Conference and participate in short courses.
2026 Award Winners
| Cecilia Bisogno, Data for Progress Hayley Boote, SSRS Robby Born, California State University, Long Beach Alexandros Christos Gkotinakos, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki Mengdi Ji, Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan Christopher Jimenez Steven Jokinsky, Center for Social and Behavioral Research at the University of Northern Iowa |
Lola Laniyi, EVITARUS Alexander Lloyd, Georgia Alliance for Progress Muhammad Nouman Nazar, University of Minnesota and National College of Business Administration and Economics, Lahore, Pakistan Jordan Reuter, SSRS Raquel Rosenbloom, NORC at the University of Chicago Joseph Rua, Ocean County College Yao Sun, Michigan Program in Survey and Data Science, Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan Leah von der Heyde, GESIS Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences |
Student Awards
AAPOR Seymour Sudman Student Paper Competition Award
This award honors the best student paper presented at the AAPOR Annual Conference. The Awards Committee considers all papers relating to the study of public opinion, focusing on theory, substantive findings, research methods, and/or statistical techniques used in such research.
2026 Award Winner
Ujjayini Das, University of Maryland College Park
“Design-Aware Ordinal Weighted Likelihood Bootstrap (D-OWLB): A Novel Model-Based Inference Method for Ordinal Disparity Measures from Complex Surveys”
Honorable Mention
Muzhi Liu, Columbia University
“When Partisan Anchors Make Parties Legible: Transnational Partisan Generalization After U.S. Political Violence”
AAPOR Student Conference Travel Award
These awards are offered to students so that they may attend the Annual Conference and experience this important educational and professional networking event for survey methodology and public opinion researchers.
2026 Award Winners
Ahmed Alyousef, Bolu Abant İzzet Baysal University
Ali Amini, American University
Valeria Castaneda Saucedo, University of Michigan
Anna Fuchs, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München
Maddie Holtz, Rutgers University
Jaehoon Kim, University of Michigan
Kim Larson, Willamette University
Jerrick Little, Willamette University
Sergio Martinez, University of Michigan
Srijeeta Mitra, University of Maryland
Axel Smart, Willamette University
Donald Snyder, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
AAPOR Student Inclusion Fellowship
Sponsored by Thomas and Dorothy Leavey Center for the Study of Los Angeles
This fellowship targets students of historically underrepresented groups interested in the study of public opinion & survey research methodology.
2026 Award Winners
Theresa Bartelme, Harvard University
Nashwa Faruk, Rutgers University, New Brunswick
Asia Foland, Harvard University
Brithney Lachira, Rutgers University
Cloud Li, Rutgers University New Brunswick
Nicholas Reign Lugu, University of Maryland, College Park
Stephanie Morales, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Emirhan Ozkan, Rutgers University
Michelle Park, Harvard University
Deji Suolang, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Juan Wulff, Harvard University