Research is a core part of the department's mission. Our research is driven by the dual goals of being theoretically grounded and socially relevant, and has been:
- Recognized with a #1 national ranking from Academic Analytics / Chronicle of Higher Education, and top 10 National Research Council rankings.
- Funded by the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the Lance Armstrong Foundation, IARPA, the Institute of Digital Media and Child Development and numerous other private and public agencies
- Published in every top journal in the field of communication
- Published across numerous other disciplines such as family studies, nursing, journalism, psychology, gerontology, political science, and public health.
Graduate Student Research
Graduate students are fully embedded in every aspect of our department research mission. All graduate students participate in faculty-led research teams, receiving training in cutting-edge research skills. Students build their academic publication record through their research team participation--see the list of first-authored grad student papers below.
Graduate student research is supported by:
- Graduate student research funding and research-related awards at the department level
- SBSRI (College level) research grants
- Access to our state-of-the-art department research labs (see below)
- An efficient, in-house IRB, and a large department research participant pool
- Access to critical research-support infrastructure such as Qualtrics and SPSS
Research Facilities
The department is developing a state-of-the-art lab for doing observational research of dyadic interaction, small group discussions, focus groups, and the like. The lab will feature a multi-camera observational array, multiple furniture configurations, a separate room for observation / recording, as well as a waiting area.
The lab will be available for use by all faculty and graduate students in the department--pictures forthcoming! We also have a multi-station computer lab equipped with Qualtrics and DirectRT which faculty and grad students can reserve for research projects. Many faculty-led research teams also have their own separate dedicated lab spaces.