Ceciley Zhang Joins CSU Fullerton As Assistant Professor

2025-03-01

Ceciley Zhang will join Cal State University Fullerton as an Assistant Professor in Digital Media beginning Fall 2025. Congratulations, Ceciley!

Ms. Zhang studies and conducts research in sociopsychological influence on adoption and outcomes of social media, AI, ChatGPT, and social robots. One of her research projects seeks to develop informative and persuasive messages parents may use to engage their children in consciously shaping their social media use toward more beneficial outcomes.

USCB Comm Alumni Council Virtual Career Series Presents Sami Kudsi, March 5, 6-7 pm: What Will You Do? Your Future Career Is Unwritten.

2025-03-05
6 pm - 7 pm

Sami Kudsi has been teaching Communication Studies at City College of San Francisco since 1994 and at San Francisco State University since 2012. He is a full-time tenured professor at CCSF, where he also serves as the Honors Coordinator and previously was the Director of Forensics for the Speech and Debate Team. His specialty is group communication, but he also enjoys teaching public speaking, debate, and interpersonal communication. He is known on both campuses as the go to guy if you are feeling anxious about public speaking or experience communication apprehension in general, because he will calm you down by listening to your concerns and validating your feelings while providing a positive and encouraging perspective. Sami graduated with a bachelor's degree with high honors from UCSB in Communication Studies in 1991. He earned his Master's degree in Communication Studies from UCSB in 1993. His favorite part of UCSB was living in the residence halls and serving as a resident assistant.

Click here to register (free) and get your Zoom link for Sami Kudsi.

For more details on the Virtual Career Series, click here.

2025 Communication Association Winter Internship Mixer

2025-03-05
6:00 pm - 7:00 pm Corwin Pavillion

Hello Gauchos! 

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UCSB Comm Association Logo

On behalf of the UCSB Communication Association Executive Board, we would like to invite you to our annual Winter Internship Mixer. Every year, this event brings together professionals with students seeking to gain experience in communication-related career paths, including – but not limited to – marketing, public relations, business, and HR. This year the Winter Internship Mixer will take place on Wednesday, March 5, 2025 from 6:00-7:30 pm in Corwin Pavilion.

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UCSB Comm Association Winter Internship Mixer

Students – Please bring your resume and wear business formal attire. This event is aimed at helping current students secure internships as
well as to gain valuable perspectives on successful internship experiences. We've reached out to various companies within the Santa Barbara area and are anticipating 30+ companies to be in attendance. 

These internship opportunities will range from this spring, summer, or even fall of this year in any sort of discipline. Additionally, the event will include a panel discussion with panelists discussing their career experience and overall advice to students. To RSVP/register, please click here: https://forms.gle/U5rWqM2b1TYJsW3n9 

If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to (epazosramirez@ucsb.edu). We hope to see you there! 

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UCSB Comm Association Winter Internship Mixer Resources

For more information on the UCSB Communication Association, click here:

https://www.comm.ucsb.edu/undergrad/involvement/communication-student-groups

Musa Malik, Kylie Falcione, Brittany Wheeler, and Rene Weber Win Top Paper Award

2025-02-11

Musa Malik, Kylie Falcione, Brittany Wheeler, and Rene Weber’s study The ecological determinants of morality: A global analysis of news media content has been awarded Top Paper at the 8th meeting of the Moral Media (2025) conference, held in Buffalo, NY. 

Abstract. This study examines the influence of ecological factors on representations of morality in global news media. Using Moral Foundations Theory (MFT) and the extended Moral Foundations Dictionary (eMFD), we analyze textual data from the Global Database of Event, Language, and Tone (GDELT) to assess how climate, resource availability, parasite stress, disaster impacts, and population density shape moral language across cultures. We included a total of 15,068,000 records from 200 territories across 1,369 unique dates, spanning from June 15, 2020, to August 31, 2024 in our analysis. Findings show that higher daily temperatures are associated with reduced use of both individualizing and binding moral language, with this effect more pronounced in historically warmer regions. Elevated precipitation is associated with decreased emphasis on binding moral foundations. Additionally, increased disaster-related injuries amplify both individualizing and binding moral expressions, while high population density uniquely heightens the emphasis on binding foundations. Altogether, we believe our findings contribute to the emerging literature on ecological determinants of morality, offering future research an empirical foundation for understanding how ecological contexts shape global moral narratives.

Karen Myers and Co-authors Publish The Communicative Constituion of Organizations: The Four Flows Model (2025)

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McPheeMyersIversonBookFlyerShort

The Communicative Constituion of Organizations: The Four Flows Model (McPhee, R. D., Myers, K. K., & Iverson, J. O. (2025) illustrates how communication makes an organization what it is, presenting in-depth information on the Communicative Constitution of Organizations. Written by a team of renowned experts in the field, this comprehensive resource is designed for all those involved in the study of organizations, particularly advanced students and researchers in Business, Sociology, Communication Studies, and the subdiscipline of Organizational Communication.

Click below to download the detailed book flyer.

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Overbye-Thompson, Hamilton, and Fisher Win ICA Top Paper Award

2025-02-11

Graduate student Hannah Overbye-Thompson, Professor Kristy Hamilton, and former graduate student now Assistant Professor at Michigan State University Jacob Fisher won a Top Paper Award from the Communication Science and Biology Interest Group for the 75th International Communication Association Conference, Denver, CO, June 2025. Their paper is “Expectation of algorithm bias increases caution: Implications for human-in-the-loop decisions.”

Here’s the abstract: Algorithms increasingly mediate our interactions with the world. Growing evidence indicates that these algorithms are prone to bias, favoring certain outcomes over others. Recent legislation mandates human oversight of algorithmic decisions to mitigate biases, but the effectiveness of such “human-in-the-loop” (HITL) interventions remains uncertain. This study investigates how individuals perceive and respond to potential algorithm bias in a simulated loan approval process, employing drift-diffusion modeling (DDM) to analyze decision-making. Our findings reveal that the expectation of bias increases caution in decision-making as well as heightened participant sensitivity to information. Intriguingly, individuals were more likely to perceive bias against female loan applicants, even when no actual bias was present. These results highlight the complex interplay between human judgment and algorithmic decision-making, suggesting that societal awareness of real-world disparities shapes perceptions of algorithm bias.

USCM Comm Alumni Council Virtual Career Series Presents Amy Reugg, February 12, 6-7 pm: Careers in Mergers and Acquisitions and Digital Client Experiences

2025-02-12
6-7 pm
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Amy Reugg Career Series

Amy Ruegg is the Managing Director of Retail Client Experience and Integration Management for Charles Schwab. She has spent to majority of her career in financial services managing large-scale, complex, disruptive innovative programs. She works to create a culture of inclusion and collaboration while empowering people to embrace divergent thinking through the lens of the customer experience. She is proud to be an approachable mentor and champion of team members, providing opportunities for growth and professional development that empower people at their highest levels. She received her BA in Communication Studies and in Political Science from UCSB in 1990. While at UCSB, she was an active member of Delta Gamma and served as the President of the Panhellenic Council.

For more details and other Career Series presentations, click here.

Click here to register (free) and get your Zoom link for Amy Reugg.

Dr. Ingunn Hagen

Visiting Researcher
Ingunn Hagen
Bio

Department of Psychology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology; Trondheim, NORWAY 7491 https://www.ntnu.edu/employees/ingunn.hagen ingunn.hagen@ntnu.no

Professor Hagen will continue her research on relationships of Yoga with well-being, and with Ron Rice on the Media Mastery project, including an updated literature review, focus groups, and an extension to the lifespan context. 

4412 SS&MS Bldg