Eszter Hargittai is Associate Professor of Communication Studies and Faculty Associate of the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University where she heads the Web Use Project. She is also Fellow at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society where she spent the 2008-09 academic year in residence. In 2006-07, she was a Fellow at Stanford’s Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences. She received her Ph.D. in Sociology from Princeton University where she was a Wilson Scholar.

Hargittai’s research focuses on the social and policy implications of digital media with a particular interest in how differences in people’s Web-use skills influence what they do online. Her work has received awards from the American Sociological Association, the Eastern Sociological Society, the International Communication Association, the National Communication Association and the Telecommunications Policy Research Conference. In 2010, the International Communication Association selected her to receive its Outstanding Young Scholar Award.

In addition to her academic articles, her work has also been featured in numerous popular media outlets including the New York Times, BBC, CNNfn, USA Today, the Chicago Tribune, the Washington Post and many others. Her work has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Markle Foundation, the Dan David Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, Nokia and Google among others.