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Mass Communication Division
National Communication Association
February 2004

Published three times annually by the Mass Communication Division of NCA.

Newsletter Contents:

• Welcome from the Division Chair

• Call for Competitive Papers and Thematic Panels

• 2003 Mass Communication Division Election Results

• Nominations for Teaching and Service Awards

• Call for Nominations for 2004-05 Officers

• Minutes of the November 2003 Business Meeting

• Division Officers Contact Information

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Welcome from the Division Chair

Hello to all members of the Mass Communication Division and a special welcome to new members and to student members. It was wonderful to see so many familiar and new faces at the Division’s panels and Business meeting. Despite the difficulties that come with moving to a new submission process, the feedback about the Miami Beach conference was very positive. Thanks for all of you for helping to make the convention a success and the Division officers deserve special recognition for their work. My personal thanks to Betsy Perse and Mehdi Semati for their work and advice. We all owe Research Chair Doug Ferguson appreciation for handling the paper competition, an especially difficult assignment during our transitional year to the All Academic system. We are a fortunate division to have such capable and patient members.

The Miami Beach program offered 21 panels that focused on a variety of perspective and topics. The 2004 convention in Chicago offers our members even more opportunities to show their abilities, talent, and creativity. Because NCA has changed to as system that allocates convention slots based on the number of division members, the Mass Communication Division allotment has increased to as many as 45 slots. I encourage our members to submit papers and thematic panels. Contact Mehdi Semati (cfms2@eiu.edu) if you have any ideas or questions about paper or panel submissions. See the competitive paper and thematic panel call that follows for more information.

The Division officers look forward to a busy and productive year. Please offer us your suggestions and ideas of ways to make our 2004 Chicago convention a success. Thanks for all your help.

Jim Walker
Chair, Mass Communication Division, NCA
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Call for Competitive Papers and Thematic Panels

The Mass Communication Division invites competitive papers and thematic panel proposals for program sessions addressing theory, research, or methodological issues in mass communication.

I. COMPETITIVE PAPERS

It is the policy of NCA that each unit should only accept one paper from any person submitting as first author.

Deadline: February 16, 2004

Paper length is limited to 25 pages excluding tables and references. Papers should be double-spaced and use 12 pt. font. Longer papers will not be considered.

Please follow the online directions for registering and uplaoding your paper. If you have difficulties uploading the papers, email David Roskos-Ewoldsen at droskos@ccom.ua.edu.

Specify Student Papers: yes (you will check a box to indicate whether it is a student paper or not, but you need to indicate in the "special instructions" box whether the student is a graduate student or undergraduate. We are going to try to have at least one panel of undergraduate papers.)

When you log onto the system, you need to have your paper completed and ready to load onto the system. You need to remember the following:

1. You should have no identifying information on your paper (e.g., *this means you should not have a title page*). You will provide the title of your paper, and name/affiliation during the registration process.

2. The abstract (250 to 500 words) will be entered separately from the paper. You should not include an abstract in the paper file.

3. The electronic version of the paper should be either a Word, Word Perfect, RTF or ADOBE document. DO NOT COMPRESS YOUR PAPER FILE.

4. A/V requests must be made at the time of submission; we regret that late requests cannot be accommodated. Please try to keep A/V request to a minimum because the NCA must rent this equipment from the hotel and it is expensive.

5. We are required to have one-fourth of our final panels in the form of "discussion panels." Ideally, the papers will be available prior to the conference on line through All Academic. However, for some units where publication in an APA journal may be an option for the presenter. an abstract of the paper will be posted and interested people will be given information (e.g. an email address for the primary author, where they can obtain a copy of the paper to read in advance of the convention. Discussion panels permit the persons who are interested to read the papers in advance. The panel itself will NOT have full paper presentations. Rather there will be discussion of the papers persons have read. These panels are designed for the audience and authors to discuss the papers. They should be an excellent opportunity to receive feedback on your paper. If you want to be considerd (or not considered) for a discussion panel, please indicate this in the "special instructions" box.

Questions regarding a competitive papers submission (not thematic panel submission) should be directed to David Roskos-Ewolsen, University of Alabama, College of Communication. Box 870172, Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0172; Tel 205-348-8082; Fax 205-348-8080; E-mail: droskos@ccom.ua.edu

II. THEMATIC PANEL PROPOSALS

Submitted panels should include:
- A title
- A panel description
- Titles and 75-word abstract for each presentation
- An abstract of no more than 75 words for the convention program
- Upload a document that contains: (1) a brief rationale; (2) a list of presenters, their institutional affiliations and addresses, and email addresses; (3) a statement by each presenter stating that they will attend the convention should the proposal be accepted for presentation

Questions regarding a thematic panel submission (not a competitive paper submission) should be directed to Mehdi Semati (cfms2@eiu.edu).

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2003 Mass Communication Division Election Results

Here are the results from the 2003 elections held during our business meeting.

Vice Chair Elect: Kristen Harrison
Secretary Elect: Heather Hundley

Research Committee:
R. Lance Holbert (serve as Chair for 2005)
Glenda Balas (serve as Chair 2006)

Publications Editor: Walter Atkinson
Web Wizard: Cary Horvath
Graduate Student Representative: Joe Watson
NCA Resolutions Committee: David Roskos-Ewoldsen

Nominations Committee: Paul Haridakis (Chair)
Rob Bellamy
Joan Conners
Janellen Hill
Doug Ferguson

Congratulations to each of our new officers. Contact information for all Division officers is at the end of this newsletter.

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NCA's Mass Communication Division Invites Nominations for
Teaching and Service Awards

The MCD Teaching Award is designed to recognize excellence in teaching, using the term "teacher" in a broad sense. In order to be considered, the nominee must be a member of NCA and MCD, have taught for over ten years, and have been recognized for their teaching excellence by their department, unit, college/university, or other group or association. This includes, but is not limited to, awards, merit evaluations, student recognition, etc. Self-nomination is encouraged in addition to nominations by others. The nomination packet may not exceed 25 pages and should include (1) a single, detailed letter of nomination addressing the qualifications of the nominee; (2) the teacher's curriculum vitae; (3) three letters of recommendation; and (4) representative publications or presentations dealing with teaching and/or curriculum, course outlines/syllabuses, innovative teaching ideas or tools, teaching evaluations and citations, evidence of mentoring and/or advising, or other forms of recognition pertaining to the nominee.

The MCD Service Award is designed to recognize exemplary service in the field. In order to be considered, the nominee must be a member of NCA and MCD, have served the NCA and MCD in a number of capacities, and have evidence of exemplary service to several of the following: NCA, MCD, the profession, the community, the department, the college or university. The nomination packet may not exceed 25 pages and should include (1) a single detailed letter of nomination addressing the qualifications of the nominee; (2) a curriculum vitae; (3) three letters of recommendation; and (4) evidence of service.

To be considered for either award, send five copies of the packet to Kristen Harrison, Vice Chair Elect, Dept. of Speech Communication, University of Illinois, 244 Lincoln Hall, 702 S. Wright St., Urbana, Il 61801. Faxed or electronic submissions will not be accepted.

Nominations should be received by May 15, 2004. Over the summer, an award committee will discuss the nominations. The award committee will consist of the immediate past chair, chair, vice-chair, vice-chair elect and secretary of the MCD. The final decision will be made by August 15. The award recipient will be contacted and asked to attend the MCD Business Meeting during the NCA annual convention to receive the award. The MCD reserves the right to not give any awards.

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Call for Nominations for 2004-05 Officers

The Mass Communication Division Nominations Committee is seeking nominations and self-nominations for division officer positions for 2004-2005. Nominations are sought for the offices of (1) Vice Chair Elect, (2) Secretary, (3) Research Committee member, (4) Publications Editor, (5) Web Wizard, (6) Nominations Committee membership (five positions), (7) NCA Resolutions Representative, and (8) Graduate Student Representative. If you or someone you know is interested in serving, please contact Paul Haridakis (pharidak@kent.edu), Nominations Committee Chair.

Vice-Chair Elect:
The year that a person is elected to vice-chair elect, that person will be responsible for overseeing the announcements of the teaching/service awards, and for selecting the award winner (with help from other members of committee). The following fall, when the person assumes the position of vice-chair, this position entails going to the program planning meeting at NCA, distributing the call for papers at the business meeting, and making sure that the call for papers is given to the program planners. As vice-chair, the person assumes the responsibility of program planner for the division, overseas the judging of panel submissions, and, with the aid of the chair of the research committee, arranges panels and competitive papers into sessions that are submitted to the NCA program planners for consideration. The responsibilities involved in this position are heaviest immediately after the convention, in February and March when division members submit papers and proposals, and during the convention itself when planning meetings occur.

Secretary:
The secretary assumes responsibility for creating and maintaining a record of communication and events at the business meeting during our annual convention. The secretary’s position spans two years. The first year the secretary takes notes during the meeting, following the format set in previous years. Election results will occur simultaneously during regular business. Those notes should be organized and put into a word process file as soon as possible after the meeting and distributed to the vice chair and secretary for review. After any corrections, a permanent version of the notes can be sent to other officers and printed for inclusion in the archive. The second year the secretary is responsible for distributing the notes to meeting attendees and presenting the notes formally at the beginning of the business meeting.

Research Committee:
The person who is elected as a member of the Research Committee will stay on the committee for three years. The first year as a member of the Research Committee, the second year as the Chair-Elect, and the third year as the Chair of the Research Committee. The responsibilities of the first two years on the Committee are mainly to assist the work of the Chair, and to be determined by the Chair. The third year as the Chair of the Committee, the person will coordinate convention paper reviews for the Division, and program competitive paper sessions based on the results of the reviews.

Nominations Committee: (five people elected, including Chair)
The Chair of the Nominations Committee solicits self and other nominations from various MCD positions from members of the Mass Communication Division and from members of the Nominating Committee. It is wise to solicit and receive such nominations by the end of the summer prior to the NCA annual meeting. In consultation with members of the Nominating Committee, the Chair seeks and receives input about the nominees and finalizes a slate of candidates for each position. With the assistance of Committee members, the Nominating Committee Chair conducts the elections during the MCD’s Business Meeting at the NCA Annual Convention.

Publications Editor:
The job of the Publicity officer is to serve as a conduit of information among NCA Mass Communication Division members and does the following three things: (1) Maintain the email list by updating it periodically (i.e., there is a constant churn in the list as new members join, some addresses change, and other drop out, etc.), (2) Writing and dispersing via e-mail three e-newsletters (e.g., in February, June, October/November). Maintaining a e-mailing list can be time consuming, as can editing and producing newsletters. But the position is enjoyable and is an important professional service. Many members of the Mass Communication Division rely heavily on the newsletter, especially the electronic newsletter, for relevant information about research, careers, and the profession.

Web Wizard:
The individual in this position maintains the web site for the division, updating the site with newsletters, names and officers, and contact information.

Graduate Student Representative:
This person serves as a “voice” representing graduate student interests in the division, relaying issues of interest and concern to officers within the division.

Representative to the NCA Resolutions Committee:
This person represents the Mass Communication Division at NCA executive meetings if any resolutions are presented to the association.

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Minutes of the November 2003 Business Meeting

National Communication Association
Mass Communication Division
Business Meeting

Saturday, November 22, 2003
Fontainbleau, Miami Beach, FL
12:30-1:45 P.M.

Elizabeth M. Perse (Chair), Presiding:

I. Call to order
Elizabeth M. Perse called the meeting to order at 12:35 P.M.
Perse welcomed the members.

II. Introduction of Mass Communication Division officers and committee members
Jim Walker (Vice Chair), Doug Ferguson (Research Committee Chair), Dwight Brooks (Secretary), Tom Reichert (Nominations Committee Chair)

III. Minutes of the 2002 Business Meeting
Secretary Dwight Brooks offered minutes of the 2002 meeting. The minutes were approved without changes.

IV. Reports and announcements from Mass Communication Division Committee officers

A. Nominations Committee: Tom Reichert, Chair, presiding
Nominations were taken and ballots distributed for the following positions/committees throughout the meeting: Vice Chair Elect, Secretary Elect, Nominations Committee, Webmaster, Publications Committee, Research Committee. Since one member resigned from the Research Committee, it was necessary to elect two new members this year.

Election Results:

Vice Chair Elect: Kristen Harrison

Secretary Elect: Heather Hundley

Research Committee:
R. Lance Holbert (serve as Chair for 2005)
Glenda Balas (serve as Chair 2006)

Nominations Committee: Paul Haridakis (Chair)
Rob Bellamy
Joan Conners
Janellen Hill
Doug Ferguson

Publications Committee: Walter Atkinson
Web Wizard: Cary Horvath
Graduate Student Representative: Joe Watson
NCA Resolutions Committee: David Roskos-Ewoldsen

At the conclusion of the voting, Tom Reichert thanked his nominating committee members.

B. 2003 Convention Program Report, Jim Walker, Vice Chair
Jim Walker thanked all the members for their patience and help with the transition to electronic submissions. The division had 21 panels which is one more than the 2002 convention. Eight of the panels were thematic and nine were competitive paper panels. Only one problem occurred with the electronic submission. For unknown reasons, the abstracts did not appear with the electronic submission on one panel. Walker appealed to the 2nd Vice President for another slot in the convention program and the panel was programed, but not as a Mass Communication Division panel.

The electronic process went well. Only minor changes had to be made to the submissions because of inconsistent use of style in submissions.

Walker thanked Doug Ferguson (Research Committee Chair) for all his hard work in answering membership queries concerning the electronic submission process.

Walker spoke to the need for developing a priority system for scheduling the days and times of the panels in the program. Walker suggested an ad hoc committee to develop priority guidelines and asked interested members to see him after the meeting.

C. Top paper awards, Doug Ferguson, Research Committee Chair
Doug Ferguson thanked all the paper reviewers and reported that the top paper winners would receive certificates and that the top student paper authors would receive certificates and checks.

Top papers in the Mass Communication Division:

"On the Effect of the ‘Third Person Effect’: Perceived Influence of Media Coverage and Residential Mobility Intentions." Yariv Tsfati, U. of Haifa, Jonathan Cohen, University of Haifa
"Enjoyment of Mediated Horror and Violence: A Meta-Analysis." Cynthia A. Hoffner, Georgia State University, Kenneth A. Levine, University of Tennessee
"Skin Tone, Crime News, and Social Reality Judgments: Priming the Schema of the Dark and Dangerous Black Criminal." Travis L. Dixon, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Keith L. Maddox, Tufts University

D. Legislative Council Report, Elizabeth Perse, Chair

The first dues increase in five years is needed to avoid a deficit. The dues increase is roughly $20-30 in each membership category. NCA is developing a free web-based journal designed for a popular audience. It is designed along the lines of Psychology Today. NCA is investigating the feasibility of electronic voting. The NCA journals are now online. A new journal index, Communication and Mass Media Index, has been created in agreement with EBSCO. The index is currently being tested and should be available in December 2003.

V. Installation of new officers, Elizabeth Perse, Chair
Perse installed the new officers with thanks for Jim Walker, Doug Ferguson, Mehdi Semati, Glenda Balas, and Dwight Brooks for their service to the division.

VI. Report on 2004 convention program, Mehdi Semati (Vice Chair) and David Roskos-Ewoldsen (Research Committee Chair)

Mehdi Semati encouraged members to nominate worthy candidates for the division’s teaching and advising awards. The nominations will go to Kristen Harrison as Vice Chair elect. The way in which NCA allocates panel slots to divisions has changed. The new method is based entirely on active division membership. As a result, the Mass Communication Division will be allotted 45 slots (up from 21 slots in 2003). The Mass Communication Division is the third largest division in NCA. Semati reported that the 2004 Call for Papers will be posted by December 10, 2003. February 16, 2004 will be the deadline for all submissions. The NCA First Vice President has announced that 25 percent of all papers in each division will be devoted to discussion panels. In order to facilitate the discussions, each paper will be posted on the Internet for the membership to read. The Mass Communication officers have drafted a resolution concerning this action because of the negative effects it can have on future publications. Semati explained that the resolution will be presented under new business (see below).

David Roskos-Ewoldsen, Research Committee Chair, spoke to the proposed discussion panels for the 2004 convention and explained that APA publications will not publish research that has been previously published on the Internet and, therefore, a note will be included in the 2004 Mass Communication Division Call For Papers asking each member to request or reject inclusion of their papers in the discussion panel option. Roskos-Ewoldsen also informed the members that they need to have their papers ready to upload when they first log on to submit their research. The papers need to be in MS Word, Word Perfect, Adobe PDF, or Rich Text Format (.RTF). However, Adobe PDF is preferred because ultimately all papers will be converted to PDF format (for more information visit www.adobe.com). The research paper files should NOT be compressed. No identifying information should be included in the paper file. Furthermore, no title page or abstract should be included with the paper file. The title page information and abstract are included separately in the submission process. The membership was asked to limit audio-visual requests.

Roskos-Ewoldsen asked that all members present to volunteer as paper reviewers. Further he encouraged the membership to be creative and come up with many submissions for the 2004 program.

VII. New Business

Chair Jim Walker invited all members to the Mass Communication Division reception immediately following the business meeting.

Secretary Emmett Winn presented the following resolution prepared by the officers:
Be it resolved. The membership of the Mass Communication Division has great concern with the proposed change concerning the addition of discussion panels in the 2004 convention and the publishing of those papers on the Internet because of the potential implications this has for later publishing of the research. In the spirit of the discussion panel idea, we propose posting abstracts (including extended abstracts) and authors’ contact information on the Internet so that copies of the papers can be e-mailed to interested NCA members.

The resolution was seconded and passed unanimously by the membership.

The meeting was adjourned at 1:45 P.M.

A reception followed immediately.

Respectfully submitted,
J. Emmett Winn, Secretary

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Division Officers Contact Information

Elizabeth Perse, Immediate Past Chair
University of Delaware
Department of Communication
Newark, DE 19715
302-831-8029
eperse@udel.edu

James R. Walker, Chair
Saint Xavier University
Department of Communication
3700 W. 103rd St.
Chicago, Il 60655
773-298-3370
walker@sxu.edu

Mehdi Semati, Vice Chair
Eastern Illinois University
Department of Speech Communication
2070 Coleman Hall
600 Lincoln Avenue
Charleston, IL 61920-3099
217-581-6314
cfms2@eiu.edu

Kristen Harrison, Vice Chair Elect
Dept. of Speech Communication
University of Illinois
244 Lincoln Hall
702 S. Wright St.
Urbana, Il 61801
217-244-7536
krishar@uiuc.edu

J. Emmett Winn, Secretary
Auburn University
Department of Communication & Journalism
217 Tichenor Hall
Auburn University, AL 36849
334-844-2761
winnjoh@auburn.edu

Heather Hundley, Secretary Elect
California State University, San Bernardino
Communication Studies
University Hall 201.14
5500 University Parkway
San Bernardino, CA 92407, USA
909-880-7377
hhundley@csusb.edu

Research Committee

David Roskos-Ewolsen, Chair
University of Alabama
College of Communication
Box 870172
Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0172
droskos@ccom.ua.edu

R. Lance Holbert
University of Delaware
250 Pearson Hall
Newark, DE, 19716-4399
(302) 831-8041
holbert@Udel.edu

Glenda Balas
University of New Mexico
Communication & Journalism
C & J Bldg Room 228
Albuquerque, NM 87131
505-277-4422
gbalas@unm.edu

Walter Atkinson, Publications Editor
Department of Communication
Northern Illinois University
209 Watson Hall
DeKalb, Il 60115
815-753-7009
watkinson@niu.edu

Cary Horvath, Web Wizard
Slippery Rock University
Department of Communication
Slippery Rock, PA 16057
724-738-2564
cary.horvath@sru.edu

David Roskos-Ewolsen, Resolutions Committee
University of Alabama
College of Communication
Box 870172
Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0172
droskos@ccom.ua.edu

Joe Watson, Graduate Student Representative
Kent State University
School of Communication Studies
PO Box 5190
Kent, OH 44242-0001
330-672-0284
wwatson1@kent.edu

Nominations Committee

Paul Haridakis, Chair
Kent State University
School of Communication Studies
P.O. Box 5190
Kent, OH 44242-0001
330-672-0174
pharidak@kent.edu

Rob Bellamy
Duquesne University
Department of Communication
Pittsburgh, PA 15282
412-396-6443
bellamy@duq2.cc.duq.edu

Joan Conners
Randolph-Macon College
204 Henry Street, Peele Hall
Ashland, VA, 23005
(804) 752-7342
jconners@rmc.edu

Janellen Hill
Regis University
Communication Department E-8
3333 Regis Blvd.
Denver, CO 80221-1099
303-458-4969
jhill@regis.edu

Doug Ferguson, Chair
College of Charleston
Department of Communication
66 George Street
Charleston, SC 29424-0001
843-953-7854
fergusond@cofc.edu

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