Undergraduate Theses

These students either “joint-majored”, “double/second-majored” or did a second degree in STS, along with a science/engineering field.

AKERA, ATSUSHI “A Social Technology: Ethnography of a Computer Terminal Room” June 1986 (Charlie Weiner, thesis advisor)

ARDHASSERIL, ROSHAN “Nuclear State: Pakistan, Domestic and International” June 2013 (Theodore Postol, thesis advisor)

BARRETT, BERTRAND H. “Theory and Design of an Educational Computing Environment” June 1985 (J.C.R. Licklider, thesis advisor)

BECERRA, JUANA C. “Herman Feshbach: What it Meant to be a Physicist in the Twentieth Century” June 2015 (David Kaiser, thesis advisor)

BELAND, CHRISTOPHER D. “Digital Technology and Copyright Law” February 2002 (David I. Kaiser, thesis advisor)

BESPOLKA, CARL G. “Green Energy Policy in the Federal Republic of Germany” May 1983 (Michael Geisler, thesis advisor)

BEST, WALDO T. “Subjective Confidence in Technology” May 1988 (Thomas Sheridan, thesis advisor) [double S.B. degrees in Humanities and Engineering]

BROWN, DAVID J. “A Framework for Analyzing Residential Electricity Consumption” May 1983 (Ted Greenwood, thesis advisor)

BRYAN, ERIC FAIN “Financing Invention” May 1988 (Robert Rines, thesis advisor)

BYFIELD, LAINI “Modern Medicine vs. Traditional Medicine” June 1999 (Joe Dumit and Hugh Gusterson, thesis advisors)

COWAN, THOMAS “Network Control in a Globalized World: How Visa and Swift’s Founding Structures Serve Their Stakeholders on the International Stage” June 2017 (William Deringer, thesis advisor)

CUNNINGHAM, KEVIN “Contemporary Computer Software and the Writing Process” February 1984 (James Paradis, thesis tutor)

DUBRANSKY, JULIAN “The politicization of science during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States” June 2021 (John Durant, thesis advisor)

FRANCO, KATHERINE A. “The Idealists and the Pragmatists. A Comparative History of Free Software and Open Source Software” May 2005 (Rosalind Williams, thesis advisor)

GARFINKEL, SIMSON L. “The Context of Funding in the Sociological Research of Paul F. Lazarsfeld” June 1987 (Peter Buck, thesis tutor) [Simson graduated in 1987 with 3 separate S.B. degrees in Chemistry, Political Science, and Humanities]

GILLESPIE, JAMES JUDSON “Going Nowhere: Pittsburg’s Attempt to Build a Subway, 1910-1935” 1990 (Robert Fogelson, thesis advisor)

GLAVIN, MITCHELL “School Attendance for Children with Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome: An Example of AIDS Policy” June 1987 (Harvey Sapolsky, thesis advisor)

GLENHABER, MEHITABEL “‘Space Became Their Highway’: The L-5 Society and the closing of the Final Frontier” June 2019 (William Deringer, thesis advisor)

GORDON, EDWARD A. “The Impact of Internet Content Regulation on the Freedom of Expression Around the World” June 1999 (David Mindell, thesis advisor)

HANSON, ELIZABETH A. “Scientific Motherhood: American Childrearing, 1890-1915” June 1984 (Merritt Roe Smith, thesis advisor)

HE, YIRAN “Breakout: How Materials Start-Ups Separate from and Stay Connected to Academic Spaces” May 2020 (William Deringer, thesis advisor)

HEIM, STEVEN F. “Sustaining Vermont: Cooperatives in Vermont’s Economic Development” February 1997 (Deborah Fitzgerald and Alice Amsden, thesis advisors)

HONG, HYEONSIL June 1990 [S.B. in Humanities and Engineering]

HORO, UZUKI “Can MIT Tolerate Its Self-criticism? – a Case of David Noble” May 2023 ( John Durant and Robin Scheffler, thesis advisors)

HUANG, TERESA “Between the Real and the Virtual: Development of Complex Relationships and Communities in the Age of the Internet” June 1997 (Sherry Turkle, thesis advisor)

JONES, BRIANNA “Defining ‘Good Science’ in Today’s World: A Video Compilation of Perspectives and Advice for Incoming Graduate Students” June 2015 (Rosalind Williams, thesis advisor)

KEEGAN, BRIAN “Defending New Jerusalem: The Foundation and Transformation of MIT’s Program in Science, Technology, and Society” June 2006 (Rosalind Williams, thesis advisor)

LEE, JENNIFER JUNG-WUK “Engineering a Sanitary Environment: William Thompson Sedgwick and Public Health Work, 1884-1921” May 1994 (Evelynn Hammonds, thesis advisor)

LYNCH, ALISON June 1990 [S.B. in Humanities and Science]

MANOLIU, MIHAI “Synthesis and Transformation: Moving Beyond Doomsday” June 1984 (John R. Ross, thesis advisor)

MARTIN, MARISSA L. “Defining a New Science: Lessons from a Brief History of the Brain Sciences at MIT” May 2000 (Joe Dumit, thesis advisor)

McBATH, BRUCE COURTNEY 1981 [S.B. in Humanities and Science]

NICHOLLS, GINA-MONIQUE R. “The Offensive and Defensive Politics of Deploying Theater Ballistic Missile Defenses in East Asia” June 2000 (Theodore Postol, thesis advisor)

PRATHER, DARCY 1991 [double B.S. degrees in Humanities and Engineering]

RAHL, GARY M. “The Auditorium and the Space Station: The Death of the American Myth” June 1989 (Leon Trilling, thesis advisor)

REUSS, RONALD “Computer-Aided Reading” June 1986 (David Clark, thesis supervisor) [double B.S. degrees in Humanities and Engineering]

REZA, FAISAL “Human Cloning: Science, Ethics, Policy, Society” February 2003 (Hugh Gusterson, thesis advisor) [double S.B. degrees in Humanities and Science]

SAWICKI, ANDRES “The Paradox Theory in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: From Research to Marketing” January 2003 (Joseph Dumit, thesis advisor) [double S.B. degrees in Humanities and Science]

SAYLOR, MICHAEL “A Machiavellian Interpretation of Political Dynamics” June 1987 (John Sterman, thesis advisor) [double S.B. degrees in Humanities and Engineering]

SHAH, SAMEER “Perception of Risk: Disaster Scenarios at Brookhaven” June 2003 (Hugh Gusterson, thesis advisor) [double S.B. degrees in Humanities and Science]

SHAH, VAIBHAVI “The Politics and Perceptibility of Breath During The COVID-19 Pandemic” February 2021 (Robin Scheffler, thesis advisor)

SHARIFI, JAMSHIED 40-minute original music composition in lieu of thesis May 1983 [S.B. in Humanities and Engineering]

SHAWCROSS, PAUL J. “The American Civil Space Program: Preparing for the Next Twenty-Five Years” February 1988 (Kosta Tsipis, thesis advisor)[double major in STS and Aero/Astro]

SKLAR, BRANDON “The Philosophical Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics” June 1982

SOLORZANO, RAMON “An Appropriate Technology: Movement Towards a Value-Laden Approach to Technology” September 1984 (Larry Bucciarelli, thesis advisor)

STICKGOLD-SARAH, JESSIE “Form and Usage: The Evolving Identity of the Computerized Medical Record” February 1997 (Deborah Fitzgerald, thesis advisor)

THOMPSON, ELIZABETH “Artificial Skin: Its Path to Adoption” February 1986 (John Sterman, thesis advisor)

WEIGEL, ANNALISA May 1995 [double major in STS and Aero/Astro]

WIENER, MATTHEW CHARLES “Attitudes Towards Computers in the Soviet Union, 1970-1986: An examination of popular-science writing” May 1987 (Paul Josephson, thesis advisor) [double S.B. in Humanities and Science]

XU, SHEILA ZHI “The Emergence of a Deaf Economy” June 2014 (Rosalind Williams, thesis advisor)