Dave Roskos-Ewoldsen to present video game research

On October 24, Dave Roskos-Ewoldsen will present some of his research on video games to the ATM group. The title of his talk is "Prosocial Behaviors and Violent Video Games." An abstract of his talk is below.

Numerous studies have demonstrated that playing violent video games increases aggressive affect, cognition, and behavior and decreases prosocial behaviors. This talk presents several studies looking at helping behavior during game play, attitudes toward bullying, and cooperative behavior as a consequence game play ­ all in the context of violent video games.

Elias to give practice job talk this week

Troy Elias, one of Osei Appiah's PhD advisees, is getting ready to go on several job interviews at research universities. This week, he will practice his job talk for the ATM group. The title of his talk is "Social Identity, Race, and Ethnicity: Predictors of Consumer Attitudes for Ethnic Minorities in Online Commercial Environments." An abstract of his talk is below.

One of the more commonly held adages of audience dynamics is that members of the audience approach mediated messages with pre-established beliefs and norms that have been established through their group associations and social networks. Media outlets, advertisers, and marketers are well advised that they no longer sell goods and services to individual consumers, but are actually in the business of selling goods and services to networks of customers. In order to understand how certain uniformities of consumer behavior occur, it has become critical to understand how groups are constructed in social systems. It is also critical to understand how members of groups communicate, and who they communicate with, specifically through new media tools. A Social Identity Theoretical Framework is proposed to examine intergroup behavior and communication amongst ethnic minorities in virtual commercial markets.

Eveland to present on Oct 10: "Questioning the Assumption of Uniform News Media Effects Across Time and Space"

Chip Eveland will present some of the work has has done with grad students Eliza Liu and Ivan Dylko. An abstract of his talk is below:

Most research on the effects of news media using survey data implicitly or explicitly assumes that the effects of news media is uniform across time and space. For instance, national survey data are employed without consideration of differences in the form and content of media available across media markets nationally, and state and local surveys are often considered to produce findings representative of research from elsewhere around the nation. Moreover, researchers tend to assume that the findings of a study in one year are comparable to findings from a study in another year. However, the quality and quantity of news content varies across media markets and has been shown to change over time as well. Theoretically, if the quality and quantity of news media content matters for news media effects, then the effects of news media use should not be uniform across time and space. In this presentation I will review two studies -- one comparing news media effects over time, and another comparing news media effects across communities in Ohio -- that test these assumptions. I will close by discussing a third study currently in progress that attempts to improve upon the first two tests.

Sohn and Pingree join ATM

ATM welcomes Ray Pingree and Dongyoung Sohn, both assistant professors, to ATM and OSU! Ray studies the relationships among mass communication, interpersonal discussion, reasoning and decision quality. Dongyoung studies media and new technologies. Welcome!

Moyer-Guse receives NCA top paper award

Congratulations to Professor Emily Moyer-Guse for receiving a 2008 top paper award from the Mass Communication Division of the National Communication Association! The award was for her submission, co-authored with Professor Robin Nabi of the University of California at Santa Barbara, entitled, "Explaining the Persuasive Effects of Entertainment Education Programming: An Empirical Comparison of Three Theories." Professor Moyer-Guse will receive the award at the annual meeting of the association this November in San Diego, CA. Well done!

Faculty, Students Win Top AEJMC Paper Awards

Congratuations to Osei Appiah and Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick for winning a top-3 paper award from the Communication Theory & Methodology division of AEJMC last month. Their paper, A Selective Exposure Experiment on Social Identity Theory: Effects of News Valence, Character Race, and Recipient Race on Selective News Reading, was very well received.

OSU Ph.D. students also won two of the three top student paper awards in the Mass Communication & Society division of the same conference -- LaMarre, Beam, and Landreville (the #1 student paper) for The Irony of Satire: People See What They Want To See in The Colbert Report (now in press at the journal Press/Politics) and Shen (the #2 student paper) for Staying Alive: The Impact of Media Coverage on Candidacy Attrition in the 1980-2004 Primaries (also now in press in the journal Press/Politics). LaMarre and Shen are both working on their dissertations and are actively on the job market now.

ATM members at NCA and AEJMC in Fall 2008

Congrats to all ATM members with accepted papers at NCA and AEMJM. And special congrats to Heather LaMarre and Kristen Landreville for their top student paper as well as Osei Appiah and Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick for their top faculty paper!

Appiah, O., Knobloch-Westerwick, S., & Alter, S. A Selective Exposure Experiment on Social Identity Theory: Effects of News Valence, Character Race, and Recipient Race on Selective News Reading. Communication Theory and Methodology Division, AEJMC. Winner of the division's Top 3 Faculty Paper Award.

Eisenberg, D. J., Stargel, S., Jain, P., Sarge, M. A., Dossett, A. P., Moreland, J. J., Heyman, T., Raup-Krieger, J. L., Katz, M. L. Newspaper Coverage of the HPV Vaccine: A Content Analysis of Appalachia and non-Appalachia Ohio Newspapers. Health Communication Division, NCA.

Eveland, W. P., Jr., Morey, A. C., & Hively, M. H. Distinguishing dimensions of political discussion using demographic, media use, political and personality variables. Communication Theory and Methodology Division, AEJMC.

Gleason, L. Spiral of Cynicism" or "Virtuous Circle": Political Alienation and Television News Use. Communication Theory and Methodology Division, AEJMC.

Hayes, A. F., Matthes, J., Hively, M. H., & Eveland, W. P., Jr. In search of the opinion climate: A new (and novel) test of spiral of silence theory. Communication Theory and Methodology Division, AEJMC.

Hively, M. H., & Eveland, W. P., Jr. Contextual antecedents and political consequences of adolescent political discussion, discussion elaboration, and network diversity: A longitudinal study. Communication Theory and Methodology Division, AEJMC.

Hmielowski, J. D., & Yamamoto, M. U.S. and Japanese press coverage of mad cow disease. Mass Communication Division, NCA.

Hmielowski, J. D. The Study of Electoral Ambivalence as Mediator of the Relationship between Talk Radio Exposure and Electoral Decision Making. Communication Theory and Methodology Division, AEJMC.

Jain, P. Gender, Body Image, Sexuality & Race on the Cover Pages of Men's and Women's Popular Magazines: A Comparative Analysis. Mass Communication Division, NCA.

LaMarre, H., Beam, M., & Landreville, K. The Irony of Satire: People See What They Want to See in The Colbert Report. Mass Communication & Society Division, AEJMC. Winner of the division’s Best Student Paper award.

LaMarre, H ., & Landreville, K. When the Movie Ends the Thinking Begins: Examining Entertainment Elaboration and the Mediating Role of Film Engagement. Communication Theory and Methodology Division, AEJMC.

Landreville, K., Holbert, L., & LaMarre, H. The Influence of Late-Night Comedy Viewing on the Consumption and Engagement of Political Discourse: A Testing of Competing Models of Candidate Issue Knowledge as Moderator. Mass Communication Division, NCA.

Mahood, C. & Cicchirillo, V. The combined effect of hysical activity and violent content in motion-sensing video games on affective aggression: A reexamination of the catharsis hypothesis. Mass Communication Division, NCA.

McDonald, D. G., Meng, J., Sarge, M., & Ragin, C. Resonance or Dampening? Relevance, Elaboration and Cognitive Interference. Communication Theory and Methodology Division, AEJMC.

Moyer-Gusé, E., & Mahood, C. Sex Differences in Entertainment-Education Effects on Safer Sex Attitudes and Behaviors. Mass Communication Division, NCA.

Willsie, B. D. Predicting Active Mediation: A Conditional Approach. Mass Communication Division, NCA