Announcements

See the calendar on the right for the full schedule.

Monday, December 22, 2008

LaMarre Accepts University of Minnesota Position

Heather LaMarre, OSU School of Communication doctoral candidate and long-time COPS member, has accepted a tenure-track assistant professor position in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Minnesota. The position will begin on August 1, 2009 and Heather will be missed when she and her family make their way to the Twin Cities. However, there is much friendship and scholarship to share between now and then. Congrats, Heather!

Monday, November 24, 2008

Myers wins second MAPOR award

Congratulations to Teresa Myers for winning in the MAPOR Fellows student paper competition for her paper titled "Public Opinion About Public Opinion: An Examination of the Use of Public Opinion Polls as a Normative Political Communication Tool Between the Public and Representatives." This makes the second time Teresa has received a MAPOR student paper award and six consecutive years that an OSU COPS graduate student has placed in the top three in this competition. Good work Teresa!

Monday, November 10, 2008

Two Forthcoming Papers By Garrett Address Political Selectivity

I thought you would like to know of two forthcoming papers by our own Kelly Garrett that address the issue of selectivity in political media consumption. Congrats, Kelly!

Garrett, R. K. (Forthcoming). Politically motivated reinforcement seeking: Reframing the selective exposure debate Journal of Communication.

Garrett, R. K. (Forthcoming). Echo chambers online?: Politically motivated selective exposure among Internet news users. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication.

Monday, November 03, 2008

The "Facebook Effect" and African-American Enthusiasm in 2008 Election

The OSU Lantern has a couple more articles out today on the results from the CBS News/UWIRE 2008 Youth Election poll. One article focuses on trends in Internet and media use among college voters while the other examines the level of election enthusiasm and participation among African-American students. Unfortunately, the online editions of the articles are missing all the cool graphics and charts with all the data comparisons - you have to read the print edition to see those.

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

CBS/UWIRE Election Poll Results

CBS News/UWIRE released the results of the their 2008 Election Youth Poll on political preferences, engagement, and mobilization among college youth yesterday (see previous posts on this project here and here).
The results for the OSU campus may be read in the Lantern. Overall, OSU Columbus students favored Obama over McCain 63 to 33%. UWIRE has a write-up on the overall results. The detailed topline results by state and the full questionnaire is available from CBS News.

Moving forward, COPS members will be analyzing these results, and a planned post-election panel survey to OSU and Cornell respondents, for academic publication.

Thursday, October 23, 2008

Princeton Panel on Accuracy and Methodology of State Polling in 2008 Election



On October 7th Princeton University held a panel on the accuracy and methodology of state polls in the election, composed of several notable methodologists and statisticians. The YouTube broadcast of the symposium is online and very engrossing.
Here is a brief description: Panelists- Christopher Achen, Professor of Social Sciences and Associate Chair of the Department of Politics at Princeton University; Andrew Gelman, professor in the Departments of Statistics and Political Science at Columbia University and director of the University`s Applied Statistics Center; and Larry Hugick, Chairman of Princeton Survey Research Associates International. Moderator: Alan Krueger, the Bendheim Professor of Economics and Public Policy at the Woodrow Wilson School and Director of the Survey Research Center at Princeton. (Oct 7, 2008 at Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Co-sponsored by the Survey Research Center, the Center for the Study of Democratic Politics, and the New York and New Jersey chapters of the American Association for Public Opinion Research.)

Monday, October 20, 2008

Early Voting Data at United States Election Project

A great resource for secondary data on voting and elections is Dr. Michael McDonald's United States Election Project website at George Mason University. It includes data on turnout trends, voter registration trends, early voting, etc.
A recent post provides data on early voting in all 50 states for the 2008 election and in some cases provides the demographic and party breakdowns for early voters. A great resource for political junkies.

CBS News Poll Closes

Last night at midnight, the CBS News 08 Youth Election Poll closed (see previous post on this project). Over 143,000 students were contacted in 47 schools across four states. The overall response rate was 18% for a total of 25,797 completed surveys. OSU was included in the sample, with 499 completed surveys and a response rate of 16.6%.
The full survey results will be released by CBS News, the Chronicle of Higher Education, and the OSU Lantern (with a focus on OSU results compared to the rest of the schools) on October 27th. After the election a COPS team will be delving into the full survey results for academic analysis and publication. We will keep you posted on the findings.

The Future of Democracy

nterested in learning about how technology is changing our democracy? How have YouTube debates, bloggers, iReporters, and political mashups impacted the presidential election? Can technology reinvigorate our democracy by connecting more people to the political process?

The Digital Union presents "The Future of Democracy," a panel discussion with Peter Shane, Professor of Law and a leading figure in the field of cyberdemocracy, and Dan Shellenbarger, director of the Ohio Channel and an Emmy award winning producer. This event will take place in the Learning Collaboration Studio (SEL 060) from 2:30-4 pm on Wednesday October 29th. RSVP to gjestvang.1@osu.edu.


Peter M. Shane, Jacob E. Davis and Jacob E. Davis II Chair in Law, Moritz College of Law: One the nation's foremost authorities on the law of the presidency, Professor Shane is also a leading figure in the newly emerging field of cyberdemocracy, which studies the use of the Internet and other information technologies to facilitate citizen participation in politics and government. His work in this field includes research funded by the NSF on the development of software to structure community-based discussions on complex policy issues. He has edited "Democracy Online: The Prospects of Political Renewal Through the Internet" and published widely on the topics of voting rights, redistricting, and reapportionment.

Dan Shellenbarger, The Ohio Channel: Dan Shellenbarger is an Emmy Award winning video director and editor who helped found and currently manages the Ohio Channel. A new concept in public affairs programming, the Ohio Channel combines Statehouse coverage with locally produced PBS programs to give a statewide perspective on issues that affect all Ohioans. In addition, the Ohio Channel encodes, hosts, and streams all coverage of state government proceedings for distribution on the Internet. Using Flash, RSS, and web tools, the Ohio Channel seeks to provide vitual access to all aspects of state government. Shellenbarger also serves as a technical editor and reviewer for the video publishing industry and is a video arts instructor for the art department at The Ohio State University.

Monday, October 13, 2008

More on Rivalries


Last fall there was a post about rivalries, which included a photo of University of Wisconsin professor Dhavan Shah wearing an OSU cap while teaching an undergraduate class at UW -- the result of a wager made when several Wisconsin faculty and students came to Columbus for the big OSU-UW game. This past weekend I went to Gainesville, FL to watch the Florida Gators battle the LSU Tigers. As most of you know, these are the two teams our Buckeyes have lost National Championship games to the last two years. My logic -- other than taking an opportunity to go to the game with my brother, who lives in Florida -- was to get to see, up close and personal, one of those two teams lose. ;-) Anyhow, I post this shot mostly for COPS' own Kristen Landreville, who earned her BA and MA from Florida. Oh, and to show OSU representing inside The Swamp. BTW, the Gators won 51-21.

Thursday, October 09, 2008

Ohio Again "THE" Battleground State in 2008

A report in the Columbus Dispatch today indicates that Ohio is once again the major target for the presidential candidates in 2008. Last week, more money was spent on political ads in Ohio than in any other state in the country when the McCain and Obama expenditures are combined. That puts us in a fantastic position to not only observe the election, but to study it as well.

Read more here.

Monday, October 06, 2008

OSU/COPS Participates in CBS News '08 Youth Election Poll

The OSU Lantern ran a front-page story today about the CBS News/WIRE Youth '08 Poll today. The survey queries full-time undergraduate students at 45 universities and colleges, including OSU, about their electoral preferences, campaign activities, new media use, and campaign information sources. Approximately 16,000 students across four battleground states (OH, PA, CO, and NC) are expected to complete the survey. The topline results of the survey will be released October 27th.

Based on an arrangement with CBS News, members the COPS team including myself, Michael Beam, Myiah Hively, and Nick Geidner will have access to the data once the survey is completed for academic analysis and publication. We will keep you posted on the results.

Thursday, October 02, 2008

Eveland receives UD Presidential Citation award


Congratulations to Chip Eveland for his recent receipt of the University of Delaware's Presidential Citation for Outstanding Achievement award. This award goes to graduates of the University of Delaware (where Chip completed an M.A. and where one of his former Ph.D. students, Lindsay Hoffman, is now an assistant professor) who, according to their web page, "exhibit great promise in their professional career and/or public service activities"

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Law School Winter Course

The message below was sent to me by Peter Shane. Some of you may be interested in this course...

As promised, I am writing in the hope that you might be able to publicize to your students my winter quarter (for them) course in The Internet, Democracy, and the Law. The course description appears below. Many thanks, Peter

THE INTERNET, LAW AND DEMOCRACY
Professor Peter Shane

Since the advent of the Internet, hopes have loomed large for its potential role in invigorating the quality of democratic life in both developing and post-industrial countries. This course will analyze the ways in which the production, consumption, and legal regulation of Internet speech and digital technologies shape the Internet's political impact on democracy, with special, but not exclusive reference to the experience of the United States.

The course will begin with an introduction to the Internet as a technological and political phenomenon, plus a brief survey of democratic theory. We will then consider the Internet as an information medium, as we might consider newspapers or broadcast journalism. A third section of the course will look at the Internet as a vehicle for governance and political action.

Our readings will introduce the idea of "e-democracy," and the challenges posed for e-democracy by issues of access, inclusion, and the digital divide. We will then consider the uses of the Internet for mobilizing interest groups, conducting electoral campaigns, as well as the phenomenon of "e-government." Following this survey, we will consider how law treats the Internet in its capacity as a "public square"or general forum for free speech. Specific topics will include fighting words, national security limits on speech, the regulation of obscenity, and defamation. We will then discuss the legal regulation of digital technologies as its affects their democratic prospects. Of particular concern will be debates over treating internet service providers as common carriers, mandating "net neutrality," promoting broadband deployment, and regulating technologies for sharing information. We will take a brief look at copyright issues and their potential impact on democracy, and then survey political and legal perspectives on data mining, data protection and freedom of information.

In order to accommodate potential enrollment by graduate students from other departments, the course is offered during the College of Law spring semester, but compressed into thirty 70-minute sessions taught over the ten-week winter quarter. Grading will be based 70 per cent on an all-essay take-home final examination, 20 per cent on student contributions to an online discussion forum, and 10 per cent on class participation. Because the College of Law spring semester begins one week later than Winter Quarter, 2009, graduate students from other departments will start this course during the second week of the quarter, and will be responsible only for the material in Classes 1-27. They will be welcome to attend the last three classes, which focus on the law of privacy, but attendance will be optional and the exam for non-law students will not cover this material. Law students and non-law students will be graded on separate curves.

Our primary texts will be Andrew Chadwick, Internet Politics: States, Citizens and New Communication Technologies (Oxford University Press, 2006), and Madeleine Schachter and Joel Kurtzberg, Law of Internet Speech (Carolina Academic Press, 3d ed., 2008).

COPS alumnus in the thick of TN election polling


COPS Ph.D. alumnus Jason Reineke, only a few months after graduation, is already getting attention with his work running the MTSU Poll. Here we seem him interviewed by local news discussing findings from a recent poll regarding the race between Obama and McCain in Tennessee. While completing the Ph.D., Jason also completed the graduate interdisciplinary specialization in survey research, which no doubt increased his value on the job market and helped him secure this position.

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

COPS Globetrotters

In the past couple of weeks COPS members have been traveling the globe sharing their research with colleagues and students in the U.S. and abroad. For instance, Andrew Hayes just returned from a trip to England and Amsterdam. In England, he presented the paper "Self-Censorship as a Psychological Syndrome" to the Morrell Centre for Toleration Workshop on Self-Censorship at the University of York. He then hopped a plane to the Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCOR) to deliver a workshop on applied statistics. Meanwhile, Lance Holbert -- feeling the first chill of autumn in Columbus -- flew south to the University of Texas at Austin to participate in a gathering of 20 political communication scholars to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the landmark agenda setting study of McCombs and Shaw.

Fortunately, as we start the first day of the autumn quarter, our friends are back in Columbus safe and sound.

Monday, September 22, 2008

Meta Analysis of Election Polls 2008

Princeton is at it again this year, with its meta-analysis of election polls. COPS members with an interest in politics, public opinion, and methodology (i.e., every single one of you) will find their web page very interesting, and even addicting.

Friday, September 12, 2008

Football, of sorts

In spite of the OSU vs. USC hoopla of late, it isn't all about football at OSU. Ok, maybe football matters, but sometimes of a different kind. The Columbus Crew is currently #1 in the MLS, and we have a number of soccer fans, students and faculty, who enjoy attending the Crew games. For instance, here we see Jorg Matthes, Erik Nisbet, Andrew Hayes, and Ray Pingree watching the Crew win again. Maybe it doesn't look that exciting from this photo, but it is. Granted, if you really want to have fun, you have to hang with the grad students in the fan section.

Young Mie's article in Journal of Communication

You may be interested in reading the press release related to the paper published by Young Mie Kim and former graduate student John Vishak in the Journal of Communication. This study, about the relative informational effects of network news and late night comedy programs, taps into a topic that has received a lot of attention in recent years. I expect that this study is going to generate some news coverage both locally and nationally. Congrats to Young Mie and John on their interesting study being published!

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

More Forthcoming Faculty and Student Publications

Here are just a few of the forthcoming faculty publications from COPS group members that I have learned about. I'm sure there are more to follow!

William Eveland and Myiah Hively, "Political discussion frequency, network size, and 'heterogeneity' of discussion as predictors of political knowledge and participation" in Journal of Communication.

Myiah Hively and William Eveland, "Contextual antecedents and political consequences of adolescent political discussion, discussion elaboration, and network diversity" in Political Communication.

Lance Holbert, Heather LaMarre, and Kristen Landreville, "Fanning the flames of a partisan divide: The role of debate viewing in the formation of partisan-driven post-election evaluations of personal vote count accuracy" in Communication Research.

Young Mie Kim, “Issue publics in the new information environment: Selectivity, domain-specificity, and extremity” in Communication Research.

Andrew Hayes and Teresa Myers, “Testing the 'proximate casualties hypothesis': Local troop loss, attention to news, and support for military intervention” in Mass Communication and Society.

LaMarre, Beam and Landreville Paper and Shen Paper Accepted at Press/Politics

The LaMarre, Beam and Landreville paper that won the top student paper award in AEJMC's Mass Communication & Society division last month -- "The irony of satire: Political ideology and the motivation to see what you want to see in The Colbert Report" -- was recently accepted for publication in the journal Press/Politics. Congrats Heather, Michael, and Kristen! This follows up the acceptance of Chris Shen's #2 student paper award winner in the same division -- "Staying alive: The impact of media momentum on candidacy attrition in the 1980-2004 primaries" -- also accepted for publication in Press/Politics. Congrats Chris!

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

A Successful AEJMC

I wanted to express my pride in our COPS graduate students who attended AEJMC this year. In addition to the #1 student paper by Heather LaMarre, Kristen Landreville and Michael Beam and the #2 student paper by Fei "Chris" Shen (both in the Mass Communication & Society division), a number of excellent papers were presented by our students. Moreover, I know that our COPS PhD students who are on the job market this year -- Heather, Chris, and S. J. Min -- all made favorable impressions with faculty at the various schools that were recruiting at AEJMC. So, congratulations to all of you who were there and presenting -- and let's keep the momentum going!

Oh, and a shout out to Osei Appiah, who not only presented a Top Three paper in the Communication Theory & Methodology division (with Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick), but also pledged his allegiance to the COPS group during the presentation. Go Osei!

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Reineke completes Ph.D.

Jason Reineke succussfully defended his dissertation this week, ending his 5 year stretch in our graduate program (2 as an M.A. student, and 3 as a Ph.D. student). With the choice between faculty positions in Washington DC and Murfreesboro TN made earlier this year, Jason now heads south to Middle Tennessee State University as a faculty member in the School of Journalism and Associate Director of the MTSU Poll run out of the College of Mass Communication. The next COPS members to hit the job market (this Fall) are Fei "Chris" Shen, Seong Jae "SJ" Min, and Heather LaMarre.

Monday, June 02, 2008

COPS students dominate MCS division of AEJMC 2008

I just received word that four COPS students have won paper prizes in the Mass Communication and Society division of AEJMC at this year's conference in Chicago. First, COPS Ph.D. student collaborators Heather LaMarre, Michael Beam, and Kristen Landreville are taking the top student paper prize with their submission "The Irony of Satire: People See What They Want to See in The Colbert Report." As if this weren't enough good news, Ph.D. student Fei "Chris" Shen will be receiving the second place prize with his submission "Staying Alive: The Impact of Media Momentum on Candidacy Attrition in the 1980-2004 Primaries." I'm sure you remember that Chris won top student paper prize last year in the same division. With their work, COPS members can claim six consecutive years of top paper prizes at AEJMC. This kind of reminds me of MAPOR 2005, when two COPS students took the top 2 slots in the MAPOR Fellows student paper competition. (Incidently, two OSU faculty members, Osei Appiah and Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, are receiving a top 3 paper prize in the Communication Theory and Methodology division this year as well).

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Hively wins Emery award

Congratulations to Myiah Hively for winning the School of Communication's Walter B. Emery Memorial Scholarship this year. This award goes to an early-career graduate student in the program with an outstanding record of research accomplishment.

Thursday, May 01, 2008

Fall 2008 Grad Course Offerings

We have three graduate courses offered in the Fall 2008 quarter that are likely to be of tremendous interest to COPS members: Statistical Moderation and Mediation Analysis (COMM 801, Hayes), Interpersonal Discussion and Politics (COMM 930, Eveland), and Mass Communication, Affect, and Emotion (COMM 940, Knobloch-Westerwick). Check out the course descriptions via the School's homepage. Enroll today!

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

COPS to Welcome Professor George Marcus of Williams College for Research Talk

Professor George Marcus (Ph.D., Northwestern University), Department of Political Science at Williams College, will be visiting the OSU campus to give a research presentation entitled, “From Neuroscience to Politics: Discovering a Hidden Geography and the Way We Navigate.” The talk will take place on May 2, 2008 at 11:00 AM in Room 360 of the Journalism Building on The Ohio State University campus.

Professor Marcus is an expert on the study of affect and politics. Some of his recent books on the subject include the following:

Neuman, W. R., Marcus, G. E., Crigler, A., & MacKuen, M. (2007). The affect effect: Dynamics of emotion in political thinking and behavior. Chicago: University of Chicago Press

Marcus, G. E. (2002). The sentimental citizen: Emotion and democratic politics. University Park, PA: Penn State University Press.

Marcus, G. E., Neuman, W. R., & MacKuen, M. (2000). Affective intelligence and political judgment. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

If you would like more information on this event, please feel free to contact Professor Lance Holbert, Department of Communication at The Ohio State University, at holbert.27@osu.edu or at 614-247-7644.

Thursday, April 17, 2008

COPS student publishes in IJP/P

Congratulations to Fei "Chris" Shen, who recently had a paper accepted for publication in a late 2008 issue of the International Journal of Press/Politics (formerly the "Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics"). This study examines media contributions to the attrition of political candidates during Presidential primaries.

Shen, F. (in press). “Staying alive”: The impact of media momentum on candidacy attrition in the 1980-2004 primaries. The International Journal of Press/Politics.

Thursday, April 10, 2008

European visitor to OSU and COPS this summer


I just received word from Jorg Matthes, currently at the University of Zurich, that he received funding from the Swiss NSF to come to OSU for a two month visit in July and August. When here, he plans on initiating various collaborations involving COPS faculty and students while taking in the Columbus scene. Feel free to get in touch with Jorg at j.matthes@ipmz.uzh.ch. Here is a link to his web page, where you can find a list of his recent publications in such places as Communication Research, the International Journal of Public Opinion Research, Communication Methods and Measures, and the Journal of Computer Mediated Communication, among others.

Wednesday, April 09, 2008

Madyson Burgess Joins OSU

I'm happy to report that yesterday I received word that Madyson Burgess, an honors undergraduate here at OSU, has accepted our admission offer and will be staying here for our MA program come the fall. Madyson has interests in survey research methods, political communication, and communication technologies. Welcome Madyson!

Sunday, April 06, 2008

Welcoming Megan Hill to COPS

I spoke with Megan Hill Saturday morning and I'm very happy to let everyone know that she has told me she'll be joining us in the Ph.D. prorgram at OSU (and in COPS) in the fall. Please welcome her -- she can be reached at meghill2@gmail.com

Thursday, April 03, 2008

Tchernev chooses OSU

I am happy to be able to report the addition of another future COPS member. After receiving several graduate school admissions offers, John Tchernev has chosen OSU for his Ph.D. study. John comes to us from Northwestern University, where he completed his B.A. A few years out of college, John returns to academics after spending time in LA as a freelance writer. Please join me in welcoming John.

Wednesday, April 02, 2008

New Course from Law School

Normally, students in the Graduate School are unable to take courses offered by the Law School. However, a special arrangement has been made so that grad students can take a course being offered by law professor and prominent e-Democracy scholar Peter Shane next winter (2009) quarter. The course will emphasize the role of the Internet in democracy. You can learn more about Peter Shane here, and do get in touch with him if you think you'll want to take his course. Keep this in mind if you have an interest in this topic...

Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Political Theory Talk

The Political Theory Workshop is pleased to announce a talk by Simone Chambers of the University of Toronto who will be speaking on:

"Rhetoric and the Public Sphere: Has Deliberative Democracy Abandoned Mass Democracy?"

Professor Chambers is a distinguished scholar of political theory and
public law. She has held various positions at Harvard, Colorado,
Princeton, and the University of Munich. She has made foundational
contributions to the study of deliberative democratic theory, democracy
and the media, and theories of civil society. More recently, Prof.
Chambers has been interested in the role of religion in public
discourse, as well as practical tensions arising within deliberative
democracy's institutional manifestations.

Please join us on Friday, April 11 at 3:30pm in Derby 2130 for what promises to be a very interesting talk, with a reception to follow.

New COPS Members

I'm happy to announce the first wave of new COPS members for next year. We have learned that Ja-Yeon ("Janey") Lee (lee.jayeon@gmail.com), who is currently completing her MA degree at the University of Texas-Austin, will be joining our PhD program in the fall. She is interested in political communication and new technologies. Jim Collier (wrcpem@columbus.rr.com), currently earning his BA here at OSU, will be joining the MA program, with interests in political communication. I know of several more students who we will be hearing from in just a matter of days, and I'll post more as a learn more. Meanwhile, please join me in welcoming Ja-Yeon and Jim to OSU and COPS!

Thursday, March 06, 2008

Interesting Link for Blog Research

Our members interested in the use of online technologies to learn about and discuss politics might be interested in this research by Microsoft (gasp!) tracking news links on blogs and the nature of the discussion of these news links by blog ideological focus. Follow the link to learn about it...

http://research.microsoft.com/projects/blews/blews.aspx

Thursday, February 21, 2008

AEJMC MCS division research award call

The Mass Communication and Society division of AEJMC has recently posted a call for its annual research award. Proposals are due by May 1st. The winner is obligated to give the division's journal, Mass Communication and Society, first right of refusal for publication of research stemming from the award. COPS members may recall that Teresa Myers and I won this award last year. The research stemming from that proposal is currently going through peer review. Here is the call for proposals.

Wednesday, February 06, 2008

COPS and OSU Welcome Ray Pingree and Kimberly Rios Morrison


I am happy to announce that, starting AU 2008, Kimberly Rios Morrison and Ray Pingree will be joining the School of Communication faculty as well as the COPS group.

Kim comes to us from Stanford, where she is completing her Ph.D. in the business school. Her research focuses on minority group influence and the conditions that prompt minority opinion expression in group settings. She also studies social identity, perceived threat from outgroups, and attitude change. Her training in organizational behavior and experimental social psychology will further enrichen an already exciting research culture. Here are a couple of her recent papers that might interest COPS members:

Morrison, K. R., & Miller, D. T. (in press). Distinguishing between silent and vocal minorities: Not all deviants feel marginal. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology [PDF]

Morrison, K. R., & Ybarra, O. (2008). The effects of realistic threat and group identification on social dominance orientation. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 44, 156-163.


Ray is completing his Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin and brings an interesting background as a computer scientist to his own theorizing about political deliberation. Some of his published work has attempted to identify ways to improve political deliberation through the use of online technologies. He has two recent publications in Communication Theory that you might be interested in:

Pingree, R. J. (2007). How messages affect their senders: A more general model of message effects and implications for deliberation. Communication Theory. 17, 439-461.

Pingree, R. J. (2006). Decision structure and the problem of scale deliberation. Communication Theory, 16: 198-222.

Please join me in welcoming Ray and Kim to COPS!

Thursday, January 31, 2008

Reineke to join faculty at MTSU

I am excited to announce that after receiving two attractive job offers, Jason Reineke has accepted an Assistant Professorship at Middle Tennessee State University's College of Mass Communication, School of Journalism. In addition to his regular faculty duties, Jason will be the new Associate Director of the MTSU poll, a survey of Tennessee residents administered by the Office of Communication Research that has been conducted twice yearly since 1998. The poll regularly surveys the public on topics including free expression, faith in major institutions, and a wide range of other public issues. Among the courses Jason will regularly teach include a course entitled "Free Expression, Mass Media, and the American Public", an examination of freedom of expression from legal, social scientific, and ethical perspectives. I know I speak for all COPS members when I say how proud we are of Jason for his hard work and dedication during his years at OSU, and we will miss seeing him around the halls of Derby.

Monday, January 28, 2008

COPS in New Orleans for AAPOR

And, to build on the ICA information, I do know that COPS will have a presence at the American Association for Public Opinion Research conference in New Orleans a week or so before ICA. Although there are likely more COPS papers, I know that Laurel Gleason will be presenting her paper "Revisiting 'The Voice of the People': An Evaluation of the Claims and Consequences of Deliberative Polling" and Jerry Kosicki will present "Public Opinion and the War on Terrorism 2001-2007." And, I have to admit, I suspect that New Orleans will be more appealing in May than Canada... ;-)

Wednesday, January 23, 2008

COPS in Montreal for ICA

Decisions have been rendered on submissions to the annual conference of the International Communication Association held in Montreal this May. As always, research in political communication and public opinion by COPS will be well represented on the international research stage. Here is a partial list of papers COPS members will be presenting.

Beam, M. A.
The portal effect: The impact of customized content on news exposure.

Hayes, A. F., Glynn, C. J., & Huge, M. A.
Cautions in the interpretation of coefficients and hypothesis tests in linear models with interactions.

Hayes, A. F., & Myers, T. M.
Testing the "proximate casualties hypothesis": Local troop loss, attention to news and support for military intervention.

Hively, M. H. & Landreville, K. D.
The interaction between efficacy and emotion in predicting civic engagement.

Holbert, R. L., & Benoit, W. L.
A Theory of political campaign media connectedness.

Holbert, R. L., & Hansen, G. J.
Stepping beyond message specificity in the study of affect as mediator and inter-affective associations: Fahrenheit 9/11, candidate aversion, and perceptions of debate superiority.

Lamarre, H., & Knobloch-Westerwick, S.
Dark black rap and bright white rock: Effects of radical music on support of ethnic groups.

Landreville, K., & LaMarre, H.
Documentary and historical reenactment film: A comparison of transportation, emotion, interest, and learning.

Kim, Y.M., & Geidner, N. W.
Politics as friendship: The impact of online social networks on young voters' political behavior.

Min, S. J., & Feaster, J.
Missing children in news: Racial and gender representation of missing children cases in television news.

Shen, F., Lu, Y., Guo, Z. & Zhou, B.
News media use, perception, and efficacy: A multi-level analysis of media participation in China.

Thursday, January 17, 2008

COPS Faculty in Public Opinion Research Handbook


The SAGE Handbook of Public Opinion Research has now hit the market, and might be of some interest to students in the COPS group. The handbook includes chapters from three different OSU faculty -- Theories on the Perception of Social Reality by COPS members Eveland and Glynn and The Methodological Strengths and Weaknesses of Survey Research by political science professor Herb Weisberg.