Program Overview

The doctoral program in Communication provides world class curriculum, faculty, and facilities to prepare students as scholars and educators. In our doctoral program, you will work with diverse faculty who study health communication, intercultural and international communication, media processes and effects, media and society, and organizational communication.

Our program centers on:

*Media, Society and Politics focuses on the role that communication plays in political institutions and in creating robust civic engagement. We examine political communication from multiple perspectives and examine the interplay of emerging technology, media, and communication with information seeking, processing, and decision making. Our research focuses on both individual-and societal-level outcomes. Faculty and graduate students work in teams to test and develop theory related to political communication.

*Media & Health Promotion focuses on media messages and health behavior. This includes social level analysis of mainstream and alternative media as products of and influences on the health of individuals and society; individual level analysis of psychological processes through which health related knowledge, attitudes and behaviors are shaped; and the creation of messages related to health and social well being, as well as how strategic message campaigns can influence decision making and social development.

*Science Communication focuses on enhancing the relevance and accessibility of scientific information and local context needed for collaborative and sustainable resource management, especially among local populations most at-risk. The program focuses on environmental communication, natural or technological hazards and the use or communication of public policy. Faculty and students specialize in science education, communication campaigns, communicating risks, risk perception analysis, spatial modeling of vulnerability and adaptive capacity of human populations, audience segmentation, media analysis and public engagement.