Amanda Lenhart studies how technology affects human lives, with a special focus on families and children. A quantitative and qualitative researcher, Amanda is the Health + Data Research Lead at the Data & Society Research Institute. Over decades, she has examined how adolescents and their families use and think about technology, how young adults consume news, how harassment has thrived in online spaces, and how automation will impact workers. Most recently, as deputy director of the Better Life Lab at New America, Amanda focused on the ways technology affects workers’ jobs and lives, as well as the family-supportive policies that enable balance between the personal and the professional. She began her career at the Pew Research Center, studying how teens and families use social and mobile technologies.
Amanda specializes in translating rigorous research for a broad national audience. Dedicated to public communication, she has testified before congressional subcommittees and the Federal Trade Commission. Amanda’s work has been featured in numerous national publications and broadcasts, including the PBS Newshour and NPR’s All Things Considered.
She currently serves on the media and communications advisory board to the Society for Research on Adolescence and advises the Technology and Adolescent Mental Wellness Program at the University of Wisconsin Department of Pediatrics as well as the Smithsonian’s Natural History Museum on a forthcoming exhibit on mobile phones.
Amanda graduated magna cum laude from Amherst College with a double major in English and Anthropology, and earned a Masters with distinction from Georgetown University in Communications, Culture and Technology.
Amanda is parent and step-parent to 4 children who range in age from elementary school to young adult.
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