Fall 2021/Spring 2022 Newsletter by Cornell Department of Communication

News from the Department of Communication at Cornell University

Fall 2021/Spring 2022

2 Chair’s Letter 3 Building for Our Future 4 Undergrad News 9 Staff News 10 Grad News 18 Special Event 19 Faculty & Academic Staff News

Editor: Kelli Carr

Message from the Chair

GREETINGS FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNICATION. I’m Lee Humphreys, new chair of the department— although I’m not so new. This month I celebrate my first year in office. And what a year it’s been! Where to begin? First I’ll express my heartfelt thanks to Poppy McLeod for her steadfast leadership and unflagging encouragement across the difficult years that coincided with her time as chair. She will be taking a well-earned sabbatical this fall, embarking on exciting new research and knitting projects. We returned to our offices in August, and we hit the ground running. In-person classes resumed, labs re-opened, and we reconnected as #COMMunity with multiple events. Our faculty continued the amazing work that has made our department the global leader that it is. The number of grants received, papers published, and honors awarded is staggering. Among these honors are multiple high-ranking appointments to leadership positions across the university. Senior Associate Dean? Yep, we’ve got one of those around here. University ombuds? We’ve got one of those too. Institute director? We have two, actually. These honors come with challenges, however, and we are working to ensure our teaching and service needs are covered. On that note, I’m very pleased to announce that we hired two incredible faculty members this year. In the fall, we searched for a tenure-track assistant professor. Historically, we’ve targeted scholars in specific communication areas, but we opted instead 2  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

for an open search. We received more than 300 applications, but the decision was clear. I’m happy and proud to announce our new faculty member: Dr. Monica Cornejo. Monica starts this summer, and we can’t wait to see what she’ll do! I encourage you to read about her in the Faculty & Academic Staff News section. But this was only one of our faculty searches. In winter/spring 2022, we participated in the CALS Cohort Search targeting scholars explicitly addressing systemic challenges facing historically and habitually marginalized and disadvantaged communities. I am overjoyed to announce that Dr. Amber Hamilton will join us in summer 2023. Look to our next issue for more details! The students remain amazing, enthusiastic, and resilient. We were incredibly proud to graduate 93 undergraduate Communication students and two interdisciplinary students this year. This spring, we held our first in-person departmental graduation in three years with standing room only in the auditorium. As part of our undergraduate mentoring program, we developed COMMConnections, a podcast featuring Advisory Board members—all leaders in the field of communication—interviewed by our students. We also expanded COMM-Unity, our undergraduate peer-mentorship program, which is having a marked impact on our first-gen and BIPOC students Our grad students are thriving, as you will see in the Graduate News section. Despite the challenge of the last couple years, they’re systematically meeting their graduate milestones: presenting their secondyear research projects, taking qualifying exams, and defending important and topical dissertations. They continue to participate in cutting-edge research, resulting in a remarkable number of publications, conference presentations, and grants and fellowships. They’re honing their teaching skills as summer course lecturers and as teaching assistants. And they’re efforts are off—they’re getting hired in a difficult market! If you find yourself in Ithaca, please do stop by. I’d love to meet you and show you around.

Building for Our Future Would you like to name a space for yourself, a designee, or organization? We have many opportunities. Contact Lee Humphreys at lmh13@cornell.edu.

The Hub

$1,000,000

Central Flex Space

$250,000 $125,000

Flex/Shared Research Space

$350,000

Research Interactive Display

Intercultural Comm Lab

$325,000

Graduate Stations (2–8 Students each)

Northwest Team Space

$125,000

Faculty Offices (22)

Media Effects Lab

$200,000

Research Team Space

Northeast Team Space

$125,000

Research Carrels (single or group)

$75–125,000 $75,000 $100,000 $50–75,000

Did you know? After 15 months away from the department, we returned late summer 2021. Business as usual? Not exactly—but we made it work. Fall 2021/Spring 2022  3

Undergraduate Student News Congratulations to Fall 2021 and Spring & Summer 2022 Graduates! IDS: Interdisciplinary Studies Gilbert Adu

Sydney Gough

Dean Noll

Gerardo Aguilar IDS

Ashleigh Gundy, cum laude

Ivie Odiase, magna cum laude

Danny Alvarado-Gomez, cum laude

Gillian Harrill, magna cum laude

Kailey O’Donnell

Trevor Bacchi

Gabby Hojilla, summa cum laude

Nabila Okudo

Maya Barbieri, magna cum laude

Kehan Hu

Jade Ovadia, magna cum laude

Joseph Bartolotto

Nicole Hu, cum laude

Jessica Palominos, cum laude

Hudson Belinsky

Macy Hung, cum laude

Andrew Parent, cum laude

Jill Bennett

James Hwang, cum laude

Benjamin Pichel, cum laude

Gabriella Berchtold, cum laude

Karelia Jaramillo, magna cum laude

Ashley Qi, magna cum laude

Cristina Brown, cum laude

Ashton Jimenez, summa cum laude

Kiki Quintero

Yiming Cai, cum laude

Elizabeth Jung, summa cum laude

Joelle Ramson, summa cum laude

Jean Cambareri, magna cum laude

Nicholas Kakheladze Svanidze

Manuel Rodriguez, magna cum laude

Ellie Carolan, cum laude

Khuslen Khosbayar, cum laude

Fraya Salzman, magna cum laude

James Cashen, cum laude

Ricardo Kiblisky, cum laude

Clare Sellers, summa cum laude

Andie Chapman, magna cum laude

Koby Kiefer, magna cum laude

Justin Sirota, magna cum laude

Benjamin Chen, summa cum laude

Kelly Kim, magna cum laude

Avery Somma, summa cum laude

Win Chen

Alexandria Kirby-Williams, cum laude

Sierra Stevenson, magna cum laude

Sara Choi, magna cum laude

Talia Kirshenbaum, magna cum laude

Olivia Swarzman, magna cum laude

Diya Chopra-Malik

Daniel Koll, cum laude

Kayla Tuchman, magna cum laude

Alana Coleman

Jessica Rose Lecorchick, cum laude

Paul Vermette, cum laude

Tyler Conroy

Ethan Lee, magna cum laude

Victoria Villalba

Cid Decatur, magna cum laude

Emme Leong, magna cum laude

Ann Maris Walton, magna cum laude

Onalee Duane, cum laude

Soﬁe Levine, cum laude

Olivia Watterson, summa cum laude

Sahara Ellis, magna cum laude

Kendall Lieberman, cum laude

Ran Wei, magna cum laude

Adam Feldman, magna cum laude

Stephanie Lim, magna cum laude

Alexa Weil, magna cum laude

Drew Flynn, cum laude

Tao Long, summa cum laude

Jalen Wise

Nolan Frisbie

Jaye Mason

Qianyue Yang, magna cum laude

Mary Gaffney, cum laude

Sophia Mathews, summa cum laude

Stephen Yang, summa cum laude

Hannah Garcia, magna cum laude

Kate Maxon, magna cum laude

Ryan Yee, magna cum laude

Tadafe Gbaje, cum laude

Isabelle McLeod-Daphnis, magna cum laude

Stephen Young, magna cum laude

Narklie Gervil, cum laude

Marie Mendy

Yuan Zou IDS

Andrew Goffin, cum laude

Natalie Monticello

Noah Gold, cum laude

Nicholas Nguyen, magna cum laude

4  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Undergraduate News Awards, Honors & Scholarships

The 1886 Persuasive Speaking Contest showcases the top speeches chosen by peers in Oral Communication classes. Winners received $1,600 in total. 1st Place: Ishan Ethridge (Landscape Architecture) argued for a Safe Injection Site in Ithaca. 2nd Place: Jaylyn Tinker (Hotel Administration) spoke in favor of making standardized tests optional for college admissions. 3rd Place: Cristina Pines (Communication) advocated for more rigorous FDA application of standards in truth in food labeling. Honorable Mention: Mach Enweremadu (Communication) spoke in favor of requiring all police to wear body cameras. Honorable Mention: Jack McKie (Biological Sciences) argued for banning youth tackle football programs.

The Eastman Rice Communication & Community Engagement Award provides $2,000 stipends to CALS students who collaborate with the Communication Institute, a partnership of the Department of Communication, Bronfenbrenner Center’s Office of Civic Engagement, and New York 4-H. Bringing together the Cornell community with 4-H youth and families from across New York State, the Institute’s mission is to share ideas on contemporary issues and develop oral communication skills. For the 2021–2022 program, awardees worked with a team of 4-H leaders, 4-H youth, and Cornell faculty to create a communication curriculum to foster consistency and excellent speaking skills in 4-H communities across the state. Student recipients: Anjiya Amlani (Communication) Melissa LaFountain (Communication) Diego Magno (Communication) Chauncy Smith (Information Science)

(literally) With generous support from alumni, the Summer Grant Program provides monetary assistance to students with unpaid summer internships, helping fund travel, housing, and food. The grants, $2,800 in total this year, allow students to pursue opportunities that would otherwise be cost prohibitive. Jingyang Liang, Marketing Assistant, Best Online Store Savanna Tong, Intern, NYSMusic.com Ziyan Xu, Intern, STEALTH Fall 2021/Spring 2022  5

Undergraduate News Awards, Honors & Scholarships, continued

The Woodford Persuasive Speaking Contest features students nominated by their Oral Communication class peers who deliver speeches to a large audience and a panel of judges. The prize was established by New York Congressperson and Lieutenant Governor Stewart Lyndon Woodford. Winners shared a $2,500 prize.

1st Place: Claire Ceske (Biology) argued for allowing teens to obtain vaccinations without parental consent. 2nd Place: Adele Williams (Communication) spoke in support of a ban on direct-to-consumer drug advertising. 3rd Place: Malachi Kennedy (Hotel Administration) advocated for granting African Americans reparations. Honorable Mention: Jinjee Chunyuh Denner (Biology) spoke in support of legalizing epigenetic modiﬁcation. Honorable Mention: Lauren Leatham (Environment & Sustainability) spoke for free college education for Americans.

The Department of Communication awarded seven departmental scholarships. Edward L. Bernays Primus Inter Pares Award: Narklie Gervil This award recognizes students who demonstrate outstanding achievement and participation in Public Relations and write an essay. The award commemorates the “Father of Public Relations,” Edward Bernays ’12. Kenneth J. Bissett Award: Gabby Hojilla The Bissett award is given to students with the best portfolio of design and written material. The award commemorates Kenneth Bissett ’90, who was aboard Pan Am Flight 103 when it was destroyed by terrorists. Chester Freeman Award: Nicholas Nguyen This award, established in honor of the Communication Professor, recognizes juniors who best exhibit the interdisciplinary character of the department. Anson H. Rowe Award: Melissa LaFountain (Junior) & Tao Long (Senior) Rowe awards are given to seniors and juniors majoring in Communication, with preference given to students specializing in interpersonal communication, public speaking, radio, or television. Alfred N. Schwartz Award: Liam Monahan The Schwartz award promotes excellence in agricultural journalism and are open to CALS students. Sheila Turner Seed Award: Lauren Pappas This award is given to junior women majoring in communication. Sheila Turner Seed was a young writer and photojournalist who died suddenly.

The following students wrote senior honors theses: Cid Decatur, "Message Characteristics of the Smash Brothers Space on YouTube: Entertainment, Jargon, and Collaboration.” Stephen Yang, “Secrecy as Self-Making: Mobile Media Tactics in Underground Electronic/Dance Music Scenes.” 6  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Undergraduate News Awards, Honors & Scholarships, continued

Pictured left: Merrill Presidential Scholars Stephen Yang and Isabelle McLeod-Daphnis. The Merrill Presidential Scholars Program honors Cornell University’s most outstanding graduating seniors.

COMM-Unity Project

Did you know? We held our ﬁrst in-person COMMConnect in three years. The event brings together undergraduate students with members of our Advisory Board—titans across multiple communication ﬁelds. This year’s event included speed networking and a podcast. Lou Diamond ’92, founder and CEO of Thrive, received the Outstanding Service Award. Award winners demonstrate high levels of engagement with and service to the department and its students. (This is a common expression for Lee, as you’ll see on the next page.) During COMMConnect and as part of our COMMConnections podcast series, Danny Alvarado-Gomez ’22 interviewed Lesley Pinckney, Director of Marketing of Intel’s Ideation & Disruptive Innovation Group. Fall 2021/Spring 2022  7

Undergraduate News Comm-Unity Project This year marks the second year of the COMM-Unity Program (CUP) designed by Department Chair Lee Humphreys and co-led this year by Professor Diane Bailey and Undergraduate Program Coordinator Heather Crespin. The program pairs peer mentors with underrepresented and ﬁrst-generation freshmen to prepare students for the challenges of university life, improve their academic success, and encourage retention. In 2021–2022, nine peer mentors—BIPOC and ﬁrst-generation students themselves—mentored 24 students. Mentors met with mentees at least four times over the fall semester. In the fall, faculty and staff joined mentors and students for a CUP social. In

recognition of the mentors’ service and leadership, we presented them with graduation honor cords. This year, we offered mentors the new leadership course, “Leading by Mentoring: Being a COMM-Unity Mentor.” Mentors attended a weekly one-credit course in which they read and shared reﬂections on topics such as time management, imposter syndrome, and summer internships. We offer our wholehearted thanks to the amazing COMM-Unity peer mentors: Tadafe Gbaje, James Hwang, Alexandria Kirby-Williams Isabelle McLeodDaphnis, Hanna Mitchell, Paige Phillips, Adele Williams, Stephen Yang, and Stephen Young.

Mentors (from left), James Hwang, Stephen Yang, Adele Williams, Isabelle McLeod-Daphnis, Alexandria Kirby-Williams, Tadafe Gbaje, and Hanna Mitchell, with Heather Crespin and Lee Humphreys (taking the photo!), gathered mid-semester for dinner at the home of Diane Bailey and her husband, Sushil Verma. 8  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Staff News Joanna Alario • Joanna received the 2021 Core Value Staff Award for Judgement. • On October 13, 2021, she became a mom to bitty baby Bernie. He’s pictured below with Joanna—their sunglass game is strong.

Irina Petryk • Irina got married! She is pictured below with her husband, Volodya, in the quintessential Cornell wedding picture.

Kelli Carr • Kelli was a recipient of the CALS Core Value Staff Team Vision Award for her work with the Interfolio project. Kelli is pictured above with Lee, Neil Lewis, Jr., also a CALS award winner, and Jeff Niederdeppe. • She worked with the Senior Associate Deans’ Administrative Assistants to revise guidelines for reappointment and promotion. • She broke in a new department chair. In April 2022, we welcomed Tamara (Tami) Payne as the department’s new Business Manager. Tami served as Administrative Manager within the School of Integrative Plant Science for several years and worked in Animal Science and Biological & Environmental Engineering before that. She also served eight years in the Army National Guard. Tami holds a Bachelor of Arts in Business Management. She’s an avid sports enthusiast, who enjoys watching her boys play football and baseball. • Tami, a founding member of the Interfolio team, saw the full release and integration of the tool in fall

2021. And for her efforts, she received the 2021 CALS Core Value Staff Team Vision Award. • She took 2nd place in her ﬁrst powerlifting competition. • And she paid off her student loans this year! In spring 2022, we said goodbye Heather Crespin (Undergraduate Program Coordinator) and Rebecca Tucker (Business Manager). Heather joined the Institute for Nonproﬁt Practice as a Program Coordinator. Rebecca joined the School of Applied & Engineering Physics in Cornell’s College of Engineering as the Director of Administration. Fall 2021/Spring 2022  9

Graduate Student News Awards & Grants The CALS Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award recognizes graduate teaching assistants who have provided invaluable support to students and faculty. Colten Meisner  Congcong Zhang The Glass Family Fellowship, honoring professor emeritus Royal Colle, recognizes students exemplifying leadership and service to the ﬁeld, department, and university. Angel Hsing-Chi Hwang  Teairah Taylor The Anson E. Rowe Award honors advanced and promising students demonstrating excellence in research and teaching. Advanced: Aparajita Bhandari  Yiwei Xu; Promising: Beatrys Rodrigues  Pengfei Zhao Jobs! • Chelsea Butkowski received a postdoctoral associate position at the Center for Digital Culture & Society

• • • • • •

at University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication, where she’ll research digital narratives of the COVID-19 pandemic. Julie Cannon is joining Roanoke College as a tenure-track assistant professor in the department of English and Communication Studies. Motasem Kalaji will be a tenure-track assistant professor in communication science in the Department of Communication Studies at California State University, Northridge. Byungdoo Kim accepted a two-year postdoctoral position at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology to study how mobile app interventions can motivate pro-environmental lifestyle changes. Catherine Lambert has been appointed as a Cornell Department of Communication lecturer in science and risk communication. Colten Meisner received a Ph.D. summer research internship at the Social Media Collective, part of Microsoft Research New England. Swati Pandita is headed to CalTech University as a postdoctoral researcher studying the neuroscience of social media.

Milestones 2nd-Year Projects • Angel Hsing-Chi Hwang, “IdeaBot: Investigating Social

Facilitation in Human-Machine Team Creativity.” • Alisius Leong, “Framing in the New Media Era: SocioPsychological Mechanisms Underlying Online Public Opinion.” • Colten Meisner, “The Labor of Search Engine Evaluation: Making Algorithms More Human or Humans More Algorithmic?” • Teairah Taylor, “What's NOT Talked about: A Critical Discourse Analysis of Health Issues in BlackOriented Magazines.” 10  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Graduate News A Exams

The following students passed their A Exams! The A Exam, or qualifying exam, consists of a written and oral examination, with the topics and format arranged in advance by the student and committee. Upon passing, the Ph.D. student is admitted to candidacy. Alisius Leong  Colten Meisner  Megan Sawey Teairah Taylor  Congcong Zhang

An advisor and a doctoral student walk into a bar. The advisor orders a rough draft, and they sit in awkward silence for eight months. B Exams

What a year for B Exams—we have eight new doctors! The following students passed their B Exams, the ﬁnal hurdle for Ph.D. candidates. Also known as the dissertation defense, the B Exam is an oral examination based on the dissertation. During the examination, students present their dissertation research in a public forum, which is followed by a Q&A with the special committee and other graduate faculty. • Julie Cannon, “Disparity Messages and Bias: Extending Stigma and Prejudice • • • • • • •

Theories through False Superior Pity, Appreciation, and Hedonic Enjoyment.” Wen Duan, “Understanding the Challenges of Sharing Humor across Linguistic and Cultural Boundaries.” Motasem Kalaji, “The Visual Is Worth Thousands of Words: Adult and Youth Perceptions of Visual Cues in E-Cigarette Advertising.” Byungdoo Kim, “Bias in Judgments of the Environmental Impact of Green Consumption: Illuminating Heuristic Processes and Boundary Conditions.” John Lunsford, “Building a Legacy of Inequality into the Future of For-Hire Transit from the Hackney Horse to the Autonomous Taxi.” Swati Pandita, ”Affective Avatars: Effects of Avatar Customization on Positive and Negative Emotions.” Melissa Seipel, “When the Mob Boss, Drug Lord, and Malevolent Queen Aren't All Bad: Audiences' Complex Understanding of and Allegiance to Fictional Antihero Characters in Television and Film.” Chao (Vincent) Yu, “Micro-Motives and Macro-Behaviors Online: Evidence from Yelp and Airbnb.” Fall 2021/Spring 2022  11

Graduate News It was another remarkable year of achievements for our graduate students. Be sure to check out the conference and publication sections, because grad students are excelling there too! Aparajita Bhandari • Aparajita received a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Fellowship. The SSHRC is one of Canada’s most prestigious awards. Chelsea Butkowski • Chelsea was interviewed by the Cornell Chronicle about her co-authored Visual Communication article, “Computing Colorism: Skin Tone in Online Retail.” Angel Hsing-Chi Hwang • Angel’s International Association of Communication pre-conference paper was designated a key paper. • Her ACM CHI Conference paper was chosen as a Top 10 Best Workshop Paper. Motasem Kalaji • Mo participated in a “Building Allyship,” a panel hosted by Cornell’s Graduate and Professional Student Diversity Council and Graduate School Office of Inclusion and Student Engagement. Emily La • Emily received an Honorable Mention for the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. Catherine Lambert • Cat was awarded the Top Student Paper Award from the Society for Risk Analysis’s Risk Communication Specialty Group, for which she was also elected secretary/treasurer. • She led the spring 2022 Science Communication Workshop (COMM 5660). • She was featured in the U.S. Department of Energy’s “Shaping the Future of Geothermal Energy” Spotlight. • Cat also served as Cornell’s team leader in the U.S. Department of Energy’s Geothermal Collegiate Competition. Colten Meisner • Colten was a consulting researcher at the Social Media Collective at Microsoft Research New England. • He is a co-recipient of a graduate working group grant from Cornell’s Media Studies Initiative to study platforms, identity, and digital culture. Swati Pandita • Swati received the CALS Alumni Association Award. She applied the funds to her research dissertation, in particular to pay study participants outside Cornell, ensuring her access to diverse populations.

Shout out to our Communication Graduate Student Association and Graduate Student Representatives! Beatrys Rodrigues, president Angel Hwang, vice president Pengfei Zhao, treasurer Megan Sawey and Teairah Taylor, graduate representatives 12  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Graduate News Achievements, continued Beatrys Rodrigues • Bya received a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. The fellowship recognizes outstanding graduate students pursuing research-based degrees in NSF-supported science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. She is also a co-recipient of a graduate working group grant from Cornell’s Media Studies Initiative to study platforms, identity, and digital culture. • She co-organized the “AI in Society Workshop,” an interdisciplinary workshop at Cornell focused on the role of artiﬁcial intelligence in society, broadly construed. • This summer, Bya is teaching Communication and Technology (COMM/INFO 2450). Megan Sawey • Megan was quoted in a Vox article about the “The Bachelor” and cryptocurrencies. • She received a grant from Cornell’s Center for Social Sciences’ Qualitative and Interpretive Research Institute. Pengfei Zhao • Pengfei received a Meta Research Ph.D. Fellowship, a global program supporting promising doctoral students engaged in innovative and relevant research in computer science and engineering.

Congratulations to our exceptional graduate students! Fall 2021/Spring 2022  13

Graduate News Conference Papers 4S (Society for Social Studies of Science) • Aparajita Bhandari, “From Eyes on the Street to Phones in Pockets: Community Safety and Surveillance through Live-Streamed Video.” • Megan Sawey, “Anti-MLM: A Consideration of Creative Labor, Identity, and Multi-Level Marketing Resistance on Social Media.” ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems • Angel Hsing-Chi Hwang, “AI in Your Mind: Counterbalancing Perceived Agency and Experience in Human-AI Interaction”; “Dangerously Convincing: Applying Guidelines of Risk Communication Message Design to Human- Centered Explainable AI”; “The Look of Trust: How Does Physical Embodiment Shape Trust in Human-Agent Interaction?”; “Too Late to be Creative? AI-Empowered Tools in Creative Processes”; “Why or Why Not: Barriers of Adopting Generative AI in Human-AI Co-Creativity.” American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting • Aparajita Bhandari, “UberEats’ Urban Imaginary: Food Delivery Apps and the Construction of the City.” American Sociological Association Conference • Bimo & Aparajita Bhandari, “Trucking on Twitch: How Self-Surveillance Renegotiates Workplace Power Dynamics.” Aspen Engaged Conference • Howe & Luke Dye, “Studying Military Veteran Transition in the Time of COVID.” Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing • Angel Hsing-Chi Hwang, “Hide and Seek: Choices of Virtual Backgrounds in Video Chats and Their Effects on Perception”; Hwang & Won, “Group- and Individual-Level Successes in Human-Agent Teams: From Trade-Off to Win-Win.” The European Communication Conference • Salma El idrissi et al.,”J’accuse: Values Incompatibility and Inter-Group Conflict in the Aftermath of Terrorist Attacks.” The Future of the Platform Economy and Platform Work • Beatrys Rodrigues, “’Becoming Waifu’—Cosplayers’ Commodification of Digitally Mediated Intimacy.” International Communication Association • Aparajita Bhandari & Noone, “Reviewing ‘Local’ Experiences, Constructing Local Enclosures: Google Maps Local Guides Platform and Configurations of Crowdsourced-Mapping.” • Chelsea Butkowski, “#SnailMailRevolution: The Networked Aesthetics of Pandemic Letter-Writing Campaigns.” • Won, Sabet, Hwang, Julie Cannon, Gaddi & McLeod-Daphnis, “Effects of Mediated Social Interactions on Pain.” • Ellie Homant, “Getting to Know Nikkie: Queer Immaterial Labor and Trans-identified Beauty YouTuber NikkieTutorials.” • Angel Hsing-Chi Hwang, “AI with(out) Faces: How Does Representation of AI Influence the Dynamics in Human-AI Collaboration?”; “Goodbye, Strong AI: Technical Limitations as the Drives for New Theories in Human-Machine Communication”; “The Virtual Background behind “Me” vs. “Us”: A Cross-Cultural Study of Video-Mediated Communication”; Hwang & Oh, “Who Sacrificed for Interactive Experience? Investigating the Effect of Interactive Visualization in COVID-19 News on Ethnic Biases”; “Interactive COVID-19 News Scares Conservatives More: The Impact of Data Visualization on Fear Arousal and Preventive Intentions.” • Emily La, “The Role of Hashtags and Mobile Media in Shaping Discourse during the #IChooseFish Environmental Movement”; La, Wang & Schuldt, “How Climate Actions by Other Countries Shape Policy Support in the U.S.” 14  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Graduate News International Communication Association, continued • Duffy & Colten Meisner, “Creator Discipline and Platform Punishment: Uneven Governance in the Social Media Economy.” • Won & Swati Pandita, “Being Yourself: A Scoping Review on How Avatar Personalization Is Implemented in Empirical Work.” • Beatrys Rodrigues, “’Becoming Waifu’—Cosplayers’ Commodiﬁcation of Digitally Mediated Intimacy”; “Should Robots Say ‘I Love You?’—Investigating Human-Robot Intimacy through Gatebox." • Lucas Wright, “Content Moderation as Spectacle.” • Yiwei Xu et al., “Local TV News Coverage of Racial Disparities in COVID-19 Impacts in the US during the First Wave of the Pandemic, March-June 2020”; Xu & Margolin, “Google Searches for COVID-Information: When, Where and What.” • Lapierre & Pengfei Zhao, “Problematic Smartphone Use vs ‘Technoference’: Examining Their Unique Predictive Power on Relational and Life Satisfaction.” International Conference on Energy Research and Social Science • Catherine Lambert, “Deep Geothermal Energy Acceptance: Interacting Imaginaries of Energy and Place in Finland, The UK, And The US”; Cousse, McComas, Lambert, Balog-Way & Trutnevyte, “How Beliefs about the Underground and Tampering with Nature Inﬂuence Perceptions of Enhanced Geothermal Systems: A Cross-National Study.” National Communication Association • Tianen Chen & Dai, “They Are Just Lightbulbs, Right? The Personality Antecedents of Household EnergySaving Intention among Young Millennials and Gen Z.” • Luke Dye, “Anchors Aweigh: Organizational Communication in the U.S. Navy”; Beebe & Dye, “Communicating Truth in C.S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity: Applying Communication Transposition Theory”; Martinson, Andelkovic, Farris & Dye, “Assessing Students’ Perceptions of Instructor Requests for Forms of Address and Likelihood of Future Interaction”; Staley, Allgood, Engstrom, Burns, Farris, Dye & Beebe, “Transforming the Communication Training and Development: Adapting the Needs-Centered Model for the 21st Century.” • Colten Meisner, “The Media Work of Queer Liveness: Digital Closets and the Case of YouTube’s ‘Live Reaction’ Genre.” • Congcong Zhang & Yuan, “A Meta-Analytic Review on Self-Enhancement in East Asian and Western Cultural Groups.” Neural Information Processing Systems • Angel Hsing-Chi Hwang, “Individuality in Human-Centered AI.” Society for Risk Analysis Annual Meeting • Balog-Way, McComas & Tianen Chen, “Biting the Bullet: Developing an Evidence-Informed Strategy for Communicating Lead Ammunition Risks.” • Catherine Lambert, “Competing Imaginaries of Energy and Place in Negotiations of Local Geothermal Energy Acceptance.” • Alisius Leong, “Framing Risks in the New Media Era: Socio-Psychological Mechanisms Underlying Public Opinion of Cultured Meat.” Did you know? We had an incredible admissions cycle this year. We received 138 applications and made ten offers—nine accepted! Our incoming fall cohort received three Cornell Fellowships, two Deans’ Excellence Award Fellowships, and one Fulbright Fellowship. Fall 2021/Spring 2022  15

Graduate News Conference Papers, continued Southern States Communication Association • Farris, Houser, Luke Dye, Odunsi & Timmerman, “Faculty and Uncertainty Management amidst Pandemic Pedagogy.” Tobacco Regulatory Science Meeting • Motasem Kalaji et al., “Examining Perceptions of Uncertain Language in Potential E-Cigarette Warning Labels: Results from 16 Focus Groups with Adult Tobacco Users and Youth.” Work in the Age of Intelligent Machine Research Coordination Network • Angel Hsing-Chi Hwang & Won, A. S., “Bittersweet: Social Comparison and Reliance on Partner Competence in Human-Agent Teamwork.” Publications • Aparajita Bhandari & Bimo, “Why’s Everyone on TikTok Now? The Algorithmized Self and the Future of

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Sociality on Social Media,” Social Media + Society; Bhandari et al., “Do You Care Who Flagged This Post? Effects of Moderator Visibility on Bystander Behavior,” Journal of Computer Mediated Communication; Bhandari & Sun, “An Online ‘Home’ for the Homeless: Analysing the Subreddit R/homeless,” New Media and Society; Kruzan, Whitlock, Bazarova, Bhandari & Chapman, “Use of a Mobile Peer Support App among Young People with Nonsuicidal Self-Injury: Small-Scale Randomized Controlled Trial,” JMIR Formative Research. Chelsea Butkowski, “Livestreaming Election Day: Political Memory and Identity Work at Susan B. Anthony’s Gravesite,” Social Media + Society; Butkowski, Humphreys & Mall, “Computing Colorism: Skin Tone in Online Retail Imagery,” Visual Communication. Julie Cannon & Niederdeppe, “Understanding Audience Beliefs and Values Is Essential for Successful Organizational Health Policy Change,” American Journal of Health Promotion; Cannon et al., “Perceptions of Arguments in Support of Policies to Reduce Sugary Drink Consumption among Low-Income White, Black and Latinx Parents of Young Children,” American Journal of Health Promotion; Cho, Cannon, Lopez & Li, “Social Media Literacy: A Conceptual Framework,” New Media & Society; “Testing Three Explanations for Stigmatization of People of Asian Descent during COVID-19: Maladaptive Coping, Biased Media Use, or Racial Prejudice?” Ethnicity & Health. Tianen Chen, Dai & Xia, “Perceived Facilitators and Barriers to Intentions of Receiving the COVID-19 Vaccines among Elderly Chinese Adults,” Vaccine; Dai & Chen, “They Are Just Lightbulbs, Right? The Personality Antecedents of Household Energy-Saving Intention among Young Millennials and Gen Z,” International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health; Xia & Chen, “Attribution of Responsibility for Pick up Artist Issues in China: The Impacts of Journalist Gender, Geographical Location, and Publication Range,” Journal of Communication Inquiry; Chen et al., “Do Messages Matter? Investigating the Combined Effects of Framing, Outcome Uncertainty, and Number Format on COVID-19 Vaccination Attitudes and Intention,” Health Communication. Luke Dye & Dailey, “Identity Interruptions: Organizational and Occupational Identiﬁcation during a Global Health Pandemic,” Organizational Communication and Technology in the Time of Coronavirus: Ethnographies from the First Year of the Pandemic; Farris, Dye, Houser, Timmerman & Myers, “Student Perceptions of Instructor Communication amid Class Disruption: Lessons Learned from the COVID-19 Pandemic,” Higher Education Implications for Teaching and Learning During COVID-19; Farris, Martinson, Andelkovic & Dye, “Exploring Students’ Perceptions of Instructor Requests for Forms of Address and Students’ Appraisals of the Instructor,” Communication Quarterly.

16  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Graduate News • Angel Hsing-Chi Hwang, “Too Late to Be Creative? AI-Empowered Tools in Creative Processes,” Extended

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Abstracts of the ACM 2022 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems; Hwang & Won, “AI in Your Mind: Counterbalancing Perceived Agency and Experience in Human-AI Interaction,” Extended Abstracts of the ACM; Hwang et al., “Hide and Seek: Choices of Virtual Backgrounds in Video Chats and Their Effects on Perception,” Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction; Herman & Hwang, “In the Eye of the Beholder: A Viewer-Deﬁned Conception of Online Visual Creativity,” New Media & Society; Oh & Hwang, “Interactive Data Visualization Enhances the Preventative Intentions of COVID-19 News Stories: The Mediating Role of Fear and the Moderating Role of Political Orientation,” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media Holley, McComas, Catherine Lambert, Snider & Tucker, “Responding to Flood Risk in Louisiana: The Roles of Place Attachment, Emotions, and Location,” Natural Hazards. Alisius Leong & Ho, “Perceiving Online Public Opinion: The Impact of Facebook Opinion Cues, Opinion Climate Congruency, and Source Credibility on Speaking out,” New Media & Society. Colten Meisner, Duffy & Ziewitz, “The Labor of Search Engine Evaluation: Making Algorithms More Human or Humans More Algorithmic?” New Media & Society; Ledbetter & Meisner, “Sharing with Just a Few “Finsta” Friends: Context Collapse, Privacy, and Imagined Audiences on Social Media,” Casing Interpersonal Communication: Case Studies in Personal and Social Relationships. Boydstun, Swati Pandita, Finkelstein-Fox & Difede, “Harnessing Virtual Reality for Disaster Mental Health: A Multidisciplinary Systematic Review,” Translational Issues in Psychological Sciences. Bharathy Premachandra & Lewis, Jr, “Do We Report the Information That Is Necessary to Give Psychology Away? A Scoping Review of the Psychological Intervention Literature 2000–2018,” Perspectives on Psychological Science. Zach Tan et al., “The Ethical Debate about the Gig Economy: A Review and Critical Analysis,” Technology in Society; Poon, Haridas, Apsley, Wong, Chang & Tan, “Digital Societies Report,” Ministry of Communications and Information, Singapore. Lucas Wright, “Automated Platform Governance through Visibility and Scale: On the Transformational Power of AutoModerator,” Social Media + Society; Dai, Wright, Chen & Calabrese, “Sexually Transmitted Illnesses,” International Encyclopedia of Health Communication; Matias & Wright, “Impact Assessment for Human-Algorithm Feedback Loops,” Social Science Research Council. Yiwei Xu, Margolin & Niederdeppe, “Testing Strategies to Increase Source Credibility through Strategic Message Design in the Context of Vaccination and Vaccine Hesitancy,” Health Communication; Xu, Winett & Niederdeppe, “Evidence of Heterogeneity in the Direction and Magnitude of Narrative Effects on Transportation and Counterarguing across Three Independent Samples,” International Journal of Communication; Winett, Niederdeppe, Xu, Gollust & Fowler, “When ‘Tried and True’ Advocacy Strategies Backﬁre: Narrative Messages Can Undermine State Legislator Support for Early Childcare Policies,” Journal of Public Interest Communications. Pengfei Zhao, Lapierre, Rains & Segrin, “When and Why We Disclose Distress on SNSs: Perceived Affordances, Disclosure Goals, and Anticipated Negative Evaluations,” Computers in Human Behavior; Zhao & Yan, “Not as Attractive and Communicatively Competent as I Expected”: The Effects of Expectancy Violations on Relational Outcomes during Modality Switching in Online Dating,” Computers in Human Behavior; Lapierre & Zhao, “Smartphones and Social Support: Longitudinal Associations between Smartphone Use and Types of Support,” Social Science Computer Review; Taylor, Zhao & Bazarova, “Social Media and Close Relationships: A Puzzle of Connection and Disconnection,” Current Opinion in Psychology. Fall 2021/Spring 2022  17

Special Event: The Geri Gay-la ON APRIL 1, 2022, WE GATHERED to celebrate the publication of Pandemic Postings: The Lighter Side of a Dark Time, “a whimsical exploration of the events of 2020—2021 in cartoons” by our own Geri Gay, Kenneth J. Bissett Professor Emerita of Communication and Information Science. Geri began painting watercolors in the early stages of lockdown, addressing topics such as pandemic fashion, binge watching, conspiracy theories, and the political divide. After emailing them to friends, faculty, and staff randomly, she was encouraged to publish them. To celebrate the book launch, the Department of Communication hosted a showing of the original watercolors and book talk. Geri gifted the department ﬁve pictures: “The New Normal,” “Bats Escape from a Lab in Wuhan, China and Steal Ballots from a Polling Place in the US,” “Punxsutawney Phil Denies Seeing His Shadow. Blames Fake Media,” “Lame Duck Dynasty,” and “America’s Growing Inﬂation Problem.” 18  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Faculty & Academic Staff News JOIN US IN WELCOMING DR. MONICA CORNEJO, an expert in interpersonal communication, who has been appointed an assistant professor. Her research uses qualitative and quantitative methodologies to examine inequities among undocumented immigrants. She has published in leading communication journals, including Journal of Communication, Health Communication, Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, and Journal of Applied Communication Research. She has also published in journals outside communication, including Cultural Diversity & Ethnic Minority Psychology. Awards include top papers from the International Communication Association’s Interpersonal Communication division and the National Communication Association’s Health Communication division. She has received 12 grants, scholarships, and fellowships totaling $104,000. Research Monica’s research centers on understanding (1) how the structural barriers that undocumented immigrants face result in different economic, educational, social, and health inequities; (2) how such barriers prompt certain communication identity management and advocacy communication strategies; and (3) what those strategies mean for undocumented immigrants’ wellbeing. Teaching Her teaching focuses on the different ways interpersonal communication can reduce or create disparities and inequities in the United States (e.g., discrimination towards sexual orientation minorities and immigrant communities), along with the strategies that members of minoritized communities (and allies, families, and co-conspirators) utilize to challenge the disparities and inequities that position minoritized group members in a second-class position.

We are excited to welcome a new senior lecturer to the department. • Dr. Michelle LaVigne is a specialist in rhetoric, professional and strategic communication, criticism, and

communication ethics. She will direct our oral communication program, teaching our core course, Oral Communication (COMM 2010), and overseeing its graduate and undergraduate teaching assistants.

We are also excited to welcome two new lecturers. • Catherine Lambert (soon to be Dr. Lambert) researches risk communication and public responses to

renewable energy, with a focus on geothermal energy, induced earthquake hazards, and the role of place, community, and history. She will teach Environmental Communication (COMM 3210), Science Writing for the Media (COMM 3020), and Risk Communication (COMM 4860). • Dr. Jamal Uddin, whose research focuses on health communication, community and global health promotion, and technology and social media, will teach Media Communication (COMM 2200), Planning Communication Campaigns (COMM 3760), and Population Health Communication (COMM 4760).

And we welcome (back) a Visiting Lecturer. • Dr. Chao Yu’s research explores online communication behaviors with a focus on individual motivations

in crowdsourcing platforms and their impacts on collective behaviors. He will teach Communication and Technology (COMM 2450) and New Media and Society (COMM 3200). Fall 2021/Spring 2022  19

EACH SPRING, WE ASK FACULTY to provide their greatest accomplishments from the year, and we’re always impressed by the volume and quality of their achievements. But as we crawled out from under the pandemic, we emerged with new insights into what “accomplishment” means. After a year of mostly remote teaching and halted or constrained research, we returned to what we do best: providing our students a world-class education and conducting socially engaged, cutting-edge research. But it’s not “business as usual.” Our teaching, mentoring, and research have been shaped by what we endured and what we learned. And in that spirit, we invite you share in our many accomplishments. While publications, grants, and awards are still featured, you will also see an emphasis on pedagogy, mentoring students, and topical research. We are one COMMunity! 20  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Faculty & Academic Staff News • DIANE BAILEY co-edited a special issue (with introductory

• NATALIE BAZAROVA

paper) in Organization Science, “Emerging Technologies and Organizing.” • She is newly appointed as the director of the Cornell Institute for Digital Agriculture. • Diane co-chaired the CALS Dean’s Roadmap to 2050 Subcommittee on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. • And she was part of a Cornell group that teamed up with faculty of the University of Minnesota and Colorado State University to submit a $20 million National Science FoundationU.S. Department of Agriculture proposal to support an Artiﬁcial Intelligence Institute for ClimateSmart Agriculture and Forestry.

received a $1.2 million National Science Foundation HumanCentered Computing Award. She is a coprincipal investigator on the grant. • She submitted an NSF Convergence Accelerator proposal for the project “Social Algorithm TestDrive: Youth Algorithmic Literacy Program to Advance Critical Evaluation and Engagement with Online Information.” • She delivered an invited lecture to Facebook entitled “Social Media Education for the Next Generation: Building Products that Educate and Offer Measurable Beneﬁt for Youth.” See also News from the Media Lab.

News from the Social Media Lab, Directed by Natalie Bazarova • All eligible SML graduate students received fellowships! • SML postdoctoral associate Ellen Zou accepted a position as assistant professor position at Pennsylvania •

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State University. Mandy Purington is defending her dissertation in July. She undertook the heroic effort of collecting data from middle-schoolers in a field study during the pandemic. Her two studies have resulted in an innovative Youth Social Media Literacy Inventory (objective measurement scales for social media literacy) and the Social Media TestDrive outcome assessment, which verified the robustness and effectiveness of the Social Media TestDrive program. Social Media TestDrive has reached more than 575,000 learners since its national launch in August 2020. After receiving the NSF Human-Centered Computing award, Natalie is moving forward with the project “Deterring Objectionable Behavior and Fostering Emergent Norms in Social Media Conversations.” The project is in collaboration with Drew Margolin (principal investigator), Rene Kizilcec, and Vanessa Bohns. In total, Natalie and her lab received four grants (three external and one internal), totaling $1.3 million. These include the NSF grant, a Google Award, the NYC Mayor's Office Community Health Award, and the Cornell Center for the Social Sciences Accelerated Grant Research Fellowship. The SML has published 12 journal articles, conference proceedings, and book chapters. Finally, the Truman Platform, and open-source, complete social media simulation, which was developed in collaboration with Dominic DiFranzo, Lehigh University assistant professor (and former SML member), was called out as a research testbed in the congressionally mandated National AI Research Resource Task Force report on “Envisioning a National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource.”

Fall 2021/Spring 2022  21

Faculty & Academic Staff News • MARISSA BELL started data collection for a Cornell Cooperative Extension/U.S.

Department of Agriculture funded collaborative project interviewing New York 4-H educators about intra-organizational stakeholder dynamics and how they inﬂuence capacity for social change. • She co-organized two conference panels for the annual meeting for the American Association of Geographers. • She is publishing “’Fixing’ the Nuclear Waste Problem? The New Political Economy of Spent Fuel Management in the United States” in Energy Research and Social Science, and “Navigating a Nuclear Past Where Archives Are Missing” in Hiding in Plain Sight: Uncovering Nuclear Histories.

• CHRISTOPHER BYRNE is prepping for a new class that he will teach in fall

2022: Sport Communication (COMM 3065). • He is the incoming chair of the CALS Committee on Support of Teaching and Learning. • Christopher helped develop and implement the undergraduate COMMConnections podcast series.

• LAUREN CHAMBLISS was appointed by the Provost to the Faculty Science

Advisory Board of Cornell University Press’s Comstock Imprint. • She is developing a course on professional writing for eCornell. • She is communication strategy consultant, content provider, and editor for AreaHub, a tech startup engaged in communicating local environmental, climate, and industrial hazards.

• JODI COHEN served on a working committee on teaching active critical thinking

skills in CALS gateway courses. CALS is currently testing the initiatives in several science classes. • She was interviewed by Cornellians about effective speaking. • She delivered the keynote address at the 2022 Department of Communication graduation ceremony. • And following a remarkable 43-year career in academia, Jodi is retiring (for the second time)! See tribute on opposite page. 22  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Faculty & Academic Staff News IN 2014, DR. JODI COHEN joined the Department of Communication as a visiting lecturer. In 2015, the department hired her as senior lecturer to direct the Oral Communication program and oversee the undergraduate summer internship program. This was following a 25-year career as a professor of communication at Ithaca College, where she retired as professor emerita. Her most successful initiative was the restructuring of our Oral Communication program, with emphasis on centralizing the course content, ﬂipping the classroom, and integrating critical listening skills through discussions of contemporary rhetoric. She was rewarded for her efforts with the 2021 SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching, which recognizes expertise, dedication, and professional achievement. Jodi also incorporated the Eastman-Rice Communication and Community Engagement award into her ongoing work with New York 4-H. She developed the former department speaking competition into two-day workshops delivered by students to the Communication Institute, a collaboration among the department, NY 4-H, and Cornell Cooperative Extension. This program better serves the award’s mandate “to foster communication between Cornell and the surrounding agricultural community.” During her time at Cornell, Jodi served on the Department of Communication Curriculum and Professional Development Committees, the CALS Learning Outcomes Subcommittee, and the CALS Diversity Committee. And because Oral Communication is a required course in the department—she taught every one of our students for the last eight years!

Congratulations on your retirement, Jodi. We will miss you! Did you know? In 2009, Jodi taught “Speaking about Global Issues” and “The Rhetoric of Place and Space” for the Institute for Shipboard Education as part of their Semester at Sea Program. BONUS Did you know? She received a National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Grant to study culture through ethnographic ﬁlms. BONUS BONUS Did you know? She’s a member of the Board of Directors for New York State.

• BROOKE DUFFY co-authored the book, Platforms and Cultural

Production, which is being translated into Italian. • She served as an expert witness for the UK Parliament’s Witness, Inﬂuencer Culture, Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee. • She co-published “Fake” Femininity? Gendered Authenticity Policing in Inﬂuencer “Hateblogs” in New Media & Society; “The Labor of Search Quality Rating: Making Algorithms More Human or Humans More Algorithmic?” in New Media & Society and “In/Visibility in Social Media Work: The Hidden Labor behind the Brands,” in Media and Communication. • And Brooke published popular pieces in Salon and Real Life.

• LEE HUMPHREYS was

elected a Fellow of the International Communication Association. • She helped recruit and hire two remarkable young scholars as assistant professors. • Her retail photography and colorism paper, “Computing Colorism: Skin Tone in Online Retail Imagery,” was published in Visual Communication—four years since the start of the project! • And Lee established the Postdoctoral Professional Development program to better support our amazing postdocs.

Fall 2021/Spring 2022  23

Faculty & Academic Staff News • BRUCE LEWENSTEIN is the associate director for public engagement of the new

Science & Technology Center for Research on Programmable Plant Systems, funded by a National Science Foundation grant. • He is newly appointed as university ombuds. The Ombuds Office serves students, staff, and faculty, helping to identify resources and solutions to problems. The office is independent, impartial, informal, and conﬁdential. • He was a Fulbright Specialist in Portugal at the Fábrica Science Center and University of Aveiro helping build science communication evaluation tools. • Bruce is currently a Lady Davis Visiting Professor at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology working on issues of inclusive science communication and developing communication training tools. • JIAWEI LIU co-published “Maintaining a Fair

• NEIL LEWIS, JR., co-launched the

Action Research Collaborative, which brings together researchers, practitioners, policymakers, and community members to address pressing social issues in society and improve lives. • He received the Janet Taylor Spence Award for Transformative Early Career Contributions from the Association for Psychological Science. • Neil also received the CALS Research and Extension Award for Outstanding Accomplishments in Science and Public Policy. • His graduate students passed their program milestones and published their work. His undergraduate students’ published research was featured on Cornell’s research website.

24  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Balance? Narrative and Non-Narrative Strategies in Televised Direct-to-Consumer Advertisements for Prescription Drugs Aired in the U.S., 2003–2016” in Journal of Health Communication; “Testing Mechanisms and Effects of Opposition-Targeted Inoculation and Visual Strategies to Promote Health Policy” in the International Journal of Communication; and “The Role of Prior Attitudes in Narrative Persuasion: Evidence from a Cross-National Study in Germany and the United States” in Communication Monographs. • Jiawei taught Population Health Communication (COMM 4760). • DREW MARGOLIN is principal investigator on a

$1.3 million National Science Foundation Human-Centered Computing grant for the project “Deterring Objectionable Behavior and Fostering Emergent Norms in Social Media Conversations.” • Drew spent his sabbatical at the Amsterdam School of Communication Research.

Did you know? We had our ten-year external review in October. Following a visit, four leading communication scholars delivered an overwhelmingly positive report on the state of the department. They describe us as “a center of excellence at Cornell, in the ﬁeld and in the country” with “multidisciplinary, deep, and broadly impactful” expertise in communication and technology, concluding, “On every measure by which one assesses the quality of an academic department, the Department of Communication excels.”

Faculty & Academic Staff News • KATHERINE MCCOMAS received a $90,000 U.S. Department of

Agriculture Hatch grant for the project “Using Risk Communication to Reduce Lead Exposure in Wild Game Consumption.” • And she received a $7,600 Cornell Atkinson Center for Sustainability grant for the project “A Cross-National Comparison of U.S. and Swiss Attitudes toward Deep Thermal Energy.” • She co-authored two journal articles: “Responding to Flood Risk in Louisiana: The Roles of Place Attachment, Emotions, and Location,” Natural Hazards, and “Eroding Land and Erasing Place: A Qualitative Study of Place Attachment, Risk Perception, and Coastal Land Loss in Southern Louisiana,” Sustainability. • Katherine was instrumental in the Public Service Center and Office of Engagement Initiatives merger into the David M. Einhorn Center for Community Engagement. Katherine is pictured in front of the Center (located in our former home at Kennedy Hall) with Basil Saﬁ, Executive Director of the Einhorn Center, and David Einhorn.

• JEFF NIEDERDEPPE joined the Jeb E. Brooks

Poppy is pictured with Dr. Robert Meyer of Weill Cornell Medicine on the stage of Carnegie Hall reviewing the graduation program for the ﬁrst in-person graduation ceremony since the pandemic. Robert Meyer is university mace-bearer, and Poppy is university marshal. • POPPY MCLEOD presented a

collaborative paper, entitled “What Kind of Student Leads? Leadership Emergence in Student Teams as a Function of Personality Traits and Contribution to Team Goals” at the Interdisciplinary Network for Group Research conference. • She is collecting data on the impact of conversation on beliefs and attitudes about climate change. • She overhauled the syllabus for Persuasion and Social Inﬂuence (COMM 2760).

School of Public Policy as Associate Dean of Faculty Development. • He posted “What Research Tells Us about Effective Advocacy Might Surprise You” on the Culture of Health blog hosted by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and the messaging guide, “Storytelling for Social Change: A Message Brief,” on the Robert Wood Johnson’s Foundation’s Evidence for Action resources page. • He co-hosted two webinars to researchers, funders, advocates, and journalists on communication to advance health and social policy: “Storytelling and the Social Safety Net” and “Communicating about Race, Class, and Health Equity.” • Jeff was elected a Fellow of the International Communication Association.

A few of the more interesting responses: • I was elected to the CALS Faculty Executive Committee (and next year we can write, “happily stepped down from”). Diane Bailey • I had a baby! Brooke Duffy • I survived my ﬁrst year of being Chair thanks to my amazing assistant, and no one quit the department, and I only got shingles once! Lee Humphreys Fall 2021/Spring 2022  25

Faculty & Academic Staff News • NORMAN PORTICELLA completed 30 in-depth interviews with leaders and staff

of community organizations and the Cornell Cooperative Extension system to document best practices, challenges, and needs for advancing collaborative efforts to address local challenges to human and environmental health/ across New York. For the project, he worked with four undergraduate students and one master of public health student. • He managed data collection for the project “The E-Cigarette Population Paradox: Testing Effects of Youth-Targeted Population Warnings for E-Cigarettes among Two Key Populations.” • He co-presented “Recruitment Methods, Inclusion, and Participatory Success in a Longitudinal Clinical Trial of a Health Communication Intervention” at the International Communication Association conference.

• JON SCHULDT served as

• KATHERINE SENDER completed

Interim Executive Director of the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research. And he was just appointed to a three-year term as Executive Director starting this summer! • He is co-principal investigator on a $2 million grant focused on a midterm election survey on methodological innovation. The survey is funded by the National Science Foundation’s American National Election Study Competition. • He revamped Communication, Environment, Science and Health (COMM 2850). • Jon completed his term as the chair of the Environmental Communication division of the International Communication Association.

the documentary Threads: Sustaining India’s Textile Tradition. She served as producer and co-director. The ﬁlm was featured in the Jaipur International Film Festival, and it screened at the Cornell Cinema, followed by a discussion led by Katherine. It is available on Kanopy. • She presented the paper “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer+ Marketing in the Age of Social Media” at the International Communication Association conference. • She also delivered an invited talk at the International Communication Association conference: “Imagining (Im)possibilities of LGBTQ Studies in Communication.”

• ANDREA STEVENSON WON was a Cornell Center for the Social Sciences

Grant Writing Fellow in the National Institutes of Health Grant Development Program. The resulting grant is under review. • She was interviewed by ABC on the dangers of the Metaverse to children. • She was named by Isabelle McLeod-Daphnis as Most Inﬂuential Faculty Member to a Merrill Scholar. • Andrea co-edited a special issue of New Media and Society on “Virtual Reality for Pro-Social Attitude Change.” See also News from the Virtual Embodiment Lab. 26  Fall 2021/Spring 2022

Faculty & Academic Staff News News from the Virtual Embodiment Lab, Directed by Andrea Stevenson Won • After a year-and-a-half hiatus, the lab resumed collecting in-person data in October 2021. • Andrea received two grants totaling $18,000 to support her research. • They published research articles in Journal of Communication Special Issue on Open

Communication Research, Frontiers in Virtual Reality, and Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking. • Lab members delivered four conference papers. • Andrea and four students from the lab participated in Tahila Mintz’s project, “Ancestral Gratitude Bridge 360” in Buffalo, NY. Students were funded by the David M.. Einhorn Center for Community Engagement. • CHAO YU published four articles as ﬁrst author: ∗“Sharing Inequalities: Racial Discrimination

• CONNIE YUAN is preparing a

in Review Acquisition on Airbnb,” New Media & Society. ∗“The Differential Impacts of Blinded Online Reviews: Comparing Socio-Emotional Features of Guest and Host Reviews on Airbnb,” Telematics and Informatics. ∗“Tweeting about Climate: Which Politicians Speak up and What Do They Speak up about?” Social Media + Society. ∗“Food ‘Taste’ on Yelp: Displays of Cultural Omnivorousness and Authenticity in Dining Choices and Online Reviews,” Food, Culture & Society.

study on air-quality issues in Manhattan Chinatown to increase awareness and boost participation in selfadvocacy initiatives. • She is developing Experiential Intercultural Communication, a course that will provide students the opportunity to visit China and experience the culture ﬁrsthand. • She is currently researching changes in East Asians’ self-enhancement behaviors. Working with advisee Congcong Zhang, she is examining the emergence of self-enhancement in the East Asian community, which was previously uncommon. • Connie served her ﬁrst year as Faculty-in-Residence at Clara Dickson Hall.

Remember the “multiple high-ranking leadership appointments” we mentioned in the Chair’s Letter? Here they are! Asterisks denote new appointments (six—not that we’re counting). • Diane Bailey, *Director of the Cornell Institute for Digital Agriculture • Sahara Byrne, *Senior Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and Strategic Programs • Lee Humphreys, Director of the Cornell Center for the Social Sciences’ Qualitative and Interpretive Research Institute • Bruce Lewenstein, *University Ombuds • Neil Lewis, Jr., *Program Director of the Action Research Collaborative • Katherine McComas, Vice Provost for Engagement and Land-Grant Affairs • Jeff Niederdeppe, *Associate Dean for Faculty Development of the Jeb E. Brooks School for Public Policy, Co-Director of the Cornell Center for Health Equity • Dawn Schrader, Chair of the CALS Academic Integrity Hearing Board • Jon Schuldt, *Executive Director of the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research Fall 2021/Spring 2022  27

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29  Fall 2019/Spring 2020

We’re back! Department of Communication Department Chair, Lee Humphreys, lmh13@cornell.edu 450 Mann Library Building  Ithaca, NY 14853  607.255.2601 Follow us on Facebook, Instagram & Twitter.  Visit us at our website.