Most recent papers:

• The Value of Questions in Organizing: Reconceptualizing Contributions to Online Public Information Goods.
  Leila Bighash, Poong Oh, Janet Fulk, Peter Monge.
  Communication Theory. September 14, 2017
  In contrast to previous research that treats question‐askers as free‐riders, this article conceptualizes questions and information requests as important forms of contribution to generating online public information goods. By requesting information, individuals make visible an informational need, calling for attention from those who may be able to fulfill that need and alerting those who share that need. Communicating questions can result in groups forming around particular shared interests, giving rise to permeable group boundaries that distinguish the interested from others. Such groups continue or even grow if new information needs are introduced. Once all information needs are fulfilled, the group will eventually dissolve, leaving their informational assets as public goods for the whole community.

  September 14, 2017   doi: 10.1111/comt.12123   open full text
• Theorizing Provocation Narratives as Communication Strategies.
  Sandrine Boudana, Elad Segev.
  Communication Theory. June 09, 2017
  Despite multiple uses, the concept of provocation is undertheorized and underinvestigated. Theorizing provocation narratives as communication strategies, this article shows that what is at stake in provocations are crucial issues of intentionality, accountability, and blame. While some provocations elicit reactions that are beneficial to the parties involved, others may incite violence. The second part of our study focuses on the latter because of their potential for shifting blame to victims. To deconstruct the mechanism by which provocation introduces this type of bias, we use Labov's method of narrative analysis and apply it to two news items. We conclude on how provocation can serve as a theoretical framework and methodological tool for narrative analysis in many communication contexts and fields.

  June 09, 2017   doi: 10.1111/comt.12119   open full text
• Breaking Away From Charisma? The Celebrity Industry's Contradictory Connection to Charismatic Authority.
  Eric Cornelis Hendriks.
  Communication Theory. June 01, 2017
  Some scholars label celebrities as “charismatic,” while others avoid that Weberian term, deeming it inappropriate in the context of celebrity culture. None, however, offers a systematic account of the relationship between Weberian charisma and celebrity. To this task, this article moves beyond the semantics toward a systematic analysis and comparison of the logics guiding charismatic and celebrity dynamics. I argue that charisma and celebrity represent distinct and even partly contradictory logics of social distinction, but that they nonetheless substantially intertwine and coextend in society, which renders their interaction ambiguous, conflictual, and creative of new social forms. This social‐ontological conceptualization provides the now‐lacking theoretical foundation for empirical studies into the many complex interactions between charismatic and celebrity dynamics throughout society.

  June 01, 2017   doi: 10.1111/comt.12120   open full text
• Language Mediation as Communication System.
  Claudio Baraldi.
  Communication Theory. May 11, 2017
  Language mediation is employed as a possible solution for problems of migrants' inclusion in institutional services, within multilingual and multicultural societies. Interpreting Studies has highlighted that language mediation is coordination of social interactions and social construction of narratives. This paper explains language mediation using Luhmann's theory of communication systems, in particular the concepts of self‐reference, reflexivity, function, structure, and structural coupling. Language mediation is observed as a self‐referential communication system fulfilling the function of promoting participation and new narratives through reflexive coordination. In particular, the concept of structural coupling explains how language mediation can enhance change within other communication systems, promoting dialogue across difference. Language mediation, however, can also assume a hierarchical structure, which creates marginalization and ethnocentrism.

  May 11, 2017   doi: 10.1111/comt.12118   open full text
• Critical Theorizing in Family Communication Studies: (Re)Reading Relational Dialectics Theory 2.0.
  Elizabeth A. Suter, Kristen M. Norwood.
  Communication Theory. May 11, 2017
  Despite modest growth in interpretive research, the study of family communication remains predominantly situated within postpositivism to the relative neglect of critical approaches. We argue that this inattention derives partly from the limited number of critically inflected family communication theories. In this article, we seek to encourage critical family communication theorizing. We do so by explicating the critical underpinnings of the recent rearticulation of relational dialectics theory, RDT version 2.0 (Baxter, 2011). We frame our (re)reading in terms of critical family communication considerations of power; connection of private familial spheres to larger public discourses and structures; and inherent openness to critique, resistance, and transformation of the status quo (Suter, 2016).

  May 11, 2017   doi: 10.1111/comt.12117   open full text
• Reconceptualizing Communication Overload and Building a Theoretical Foundation.
  Keri K. Stephens, Dron M. Mandhana, JiHye J. Kim, Xiaoqian Li, Elizabeth M. Glowacki, Ignacio Cruz.
  Communication Theory. March 10, 2017
  This study reconceptualizes communication overload and builds a theoretical foundation to understand how this phenomenon applies in contemporary life. We build theory by relying on past research and using a Q‐method to capture the subjective perspectives of people who experience communication overload. In our refinement of this abstract concept, we identified seven dimensions composing communication overload. The dimensions included: compromising message quality, having many distractions, using many information and communication technologies, pressuring for decisions, feeling responsible to respond, overwhelming with information, and piling up of messages. Our reconceptualization integrates disparate research, links the availability–expectation–pressure pattern to overload, and elaborates on communication quality, quantity, and generalized perceptions of feeling overwhelmed. The resulting formative theoretical model sets the stage for additional theorizing and empirical studies.

  March 10, 2017   doi: 10.1111/comt.12116   open full text
• Theorizing the Relationship Between Gender and Health Through a Case Study of Nepalese Street‐Based Female Sex Workers.
  Iccha Basnyat.
  Communication Theory. February 23, 2017
  The environmental‐structural communication approach attempts to reduce the prevalence of individual health risks to female sex workers' (FSW) through community‐level interventions. However, I argue that this approach narrowly defines health and such communication efforts are focused on changing the work environment to facilitate the reduction of individual risk prevalence. Based on 35 in‐depth interviews, I use lived experiences of FSWs as a case study to discuss the relationships between gender and health. The intersectionality framework allows health communication efforts to incorporate analysis of multiple and simultaneous influences of gender relations, gender identities, and class on the transmission of health risks. These intersections draw our attention to think differently about inequalities and vulnerabilities that shape health and health behaviors of FSWs.

  February 23, 2017   doi: 10.1111/comt.12114   open full text
• A Framework of Relational Information Control: A Review and Extension of Information Control Research in Interpersonal Contexts.
  Jenny L. Crowley.
  Communication Theory. February 23, 2017
  Research on information control in interpersonal contexts has grown in the last 30 years. Scholars have considered multiple manifestations of information control, including taboo topics, topic avoidance, privacy, and secrecy, as ways individuals withhold information. This paper reviews and presents limitations of the extant literature, including conflating different manifestations, privileging explicit acts, and presuming agency. The paper then addresses these limitations by proposing a new framework that articulates a process and typology of information control in relationships. The typology departs from existing research to categorize information control based on the perspectives of the sender and receiver. In so doing, the framework organizes several strands of research to offer a comprehensive approach to the study of information control in interpersonal contexts.

  February 23, 2017   doi: 10.1111/comt.12115   open full text
• A Dual‐Identity Model of Responses to Deviance in Online Groups: Integrating Social Identity Theory and Expectancy Violations Theory.
  Spencer Byron Nicholls, Ronald E. Rice.
  Communication Theory. January 11, 2017
  Several theories have sought to address responses to normatively deviant behavior, but have done so with a focus either on group‐level or on individual‐level behavior. Yet, due to some characteristics of online contexts, identities can be salient at both a group and/or individual level, creating a more complex set of influences on responding to deviance. We explore responses to online communicative deviance by integrating social identity approaches (a group‐level perspective) and expectancy violations theory (an individual‐level perspective). Social identity emphasizes the role of group identification in responding to deviance, especially relevant in anonymous online contexts, while expectancy violations theory notes how individuals respond to ambiguous deviance through assessing the reward value of the deviant.

  January 11, 2017   doi: 10.1111/comt.12113   open full text
• Journalistic Roles and the Struggle Over Institutional Identity: The Discursive Constitution of Journalism.
  Thomas Hanitzsch, Tim P. Vos.
  Communication Theory. January 10, 2017
  The study of journalistic roles tends to be descriptive and is thin on theory. This article advances an understanding of journalistic roles as being discursively constituted and builds on the notion of journalism as a discursive institution. Journalistic roles are negotiated in a relational structure—the discursive field—where journalists, news outlets, and media organizations struggle over discursive authority in conversations about journalism's identity and locus in society. Journalistic roles are articulated and enacted on 2 distinct levels: role orientations (normative and cognitive roles) and role performance (practiced and narrated roles). The process model of journalistic roles proposes a circular structure, where normative, cognitive, practiced, and narrated roles are connected through processes of internalization, enactment, reflection, normalization, and negotiation.

  January 10, 2017   doi: 10.1111/comt.12112   open full text
• The Social Relativity of Digital Exclusion: Applying Relative Deprivation Theory to Digital Inequalities.
  Ellen Johanna Helsper.
  Communication Theory. November 23, 2016
  Digital inequalities research adopted the idea that exclusion is compound and multifaceted. Nevertheless, digital exclusion theory and empirical research often takes an individual, static approach; assuming that personal characteristics such as socioeconomic status consistently influence how individuals engage with information and communication technologies across different contexts. This article makes a theoretical contribution by looking at the value of relative deprivation theory (RDT) in understanding digital inequalities. RDT argues that evaluations of personal circumstances depend on social and temporal contexts and are, therefore, relative. Digital inequalities research could benefit from a shift toward this relative approach in both theorization and empirical research by incorporating explanations based on context and social group processes into existing individual and structural explanations of digital inequalities.

  November 23, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12110   open full text
• Collective Action Recruitment in a Digital Age: Applying Signaling Theory to Filtering Behaviors.
  Tamar Ashuri, Yaniv Bar‐Ilan.
  Communication Theory. November 22, 2016
  The ways in which various groups use affordable Internet‐based tools to expand the scope and variety of their members is well documented. We focus on the means they develop for identifying “suitable” members. Drawing on signaling theory, we offer a framework for analyzing recruitment practices in a digital media environment. We demonstrate that despite the differences among groups, a common logic guiding filtering behavior is the search for cost‐discriminating signs of trustworthiness, that is, signals attesting to the candidates' characteristics that are too costly for mimics to fake, but affordable for the genuinely trustworthy recruit. Focusing on collective action organizations, we propose a typology of organizations and trace the filtering tactics they develop for identifying members who manifest desired attributes.

  November 22, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12108   open full text
• Level Up! Refreshing Parental Mediation Theory for Our Digital Media Landscape.
  Hee Jhee Jiow, Sun Sun Lim, Julian Lin.
  Communication Theory. November 22, 2016
  This article argues that parental mediation theory is rooted in television studies and must be refined to accommodate the fast‐changing media landscape that is populated by complex and intensively used media forms such as video games, social media, and mobile apps. Through a study of parental mediation of children's video game play, we identify the limitations of parental mediation theory as applied to current trends in children's media use and suggest how it can be enhanced. This study seeks to improve parental mediation theory's descriptive and explanatory strength by identifying and outlining the specific activities that parents undertake as they impose their media strategies. We explain how restrictive, co‐use, and active mediation are constituted by gatekeeping, discursive, diversionary, and investigative activities.

  November 22, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12109   open full text
• Hate Spin: The Twin Political Strategies of Religious Incitement and Offense‐Taking.
  Cherian George.
  Communication Theory. November 22, 2016
  Religious intolerance manifests itself periodically in ways that test democracies' commitment to freedom of expression. Responding to this challenge requires a conceptual clarity that is often lacking. This article proposes a corrective lens in the form of a new concept, hate spin. Hate spin absorbs the familiar concept of hate speech, or incitement, and combines it with the less understood strategy of offense‐taking or manufactured indignation. The two sides of hate spin—incitement and offense‐taking—are used by political entrepreneurs to mobilize supporters and coerce targeted groups. Incitement may warrant legal intervention, but censorship is a counterproductive response to offense. The article explicates the concept of hate spin, identifies its key characteristics, and suggests directions for further research.

  November 22, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12111   open full text
• Theoretical Approaches to Normativity in Communication Research.
  Liane Tessa Rothenberger, Claudia Auer, Cornelius B. Pratt.
  Communication Theory. November 21, 2016
  Normativity is inarguably a major concept in the social sciences. Even so, social science research seldom acknowledges its importance, its influence on research inquiries, and its impact on the trajectories of communication science and on the scientists themselves. It is against that background that this article calls for a better understanding of the role of normativity in communication studies. In doing so, it analyzes Bourdieu's theoretical framework of field, habitus, and capital and how the intersection of all three concepts helps explain and justify the importance of norms in communication research. Finally, this article identifies differences between the norms of the orthodox and the heretics, based on various schools of thought and on paradigms from both U.S. and German communication–research histories.

  November 21, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12103   open full text
• Imitation (In)Security: Cultivating Mimetic Theory to Critique the Media/Security Nexus.
  Bryan C. Taylor.
  Communication Theory. November 17, 2016
  Contemporary media culture frequently associates security with imitation. This essay theorizes critique of related textuality within the contemporary “media/security nexus.” It advocates for enhanced usage of mimetic theory to critique media representation of security, as that condition is pursued through cultural practices of adaptation, disguise, and simulation. Two competing traditions of mimetic theory are reviewed, along with their appropriations in the fields of media studies and security studies. Four benefits are proposed for mimetic critique of “media/security.” The essay concludes by considering the ethical and political stakes of this critique.

  November 17, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12104   open full text
• The Softening of Journalistic Political Communication: A Comprehensive Framework Model of Sensationalism, Soft News, Infotainment, and Tabloidization.
  Lukas Otto, Isabella Glogger, Mark Boukes.
  Communication Theory. November 16, 2016
  Despite the scholarly popularity of important developments of political communication, concepts like soft news or infotainment lack conceptual clarity. This article tackles that problem and introduces a multilevel framework model of softening of journalistic political communication, which shows that the 4 most prominent concepts—(a) sensationalism, (b) hard and soft news (HSN), (c) infotainment, and (d) tabloidization, and, additionally, (e) eroding of boundaries of journalism—can be distinguished in a hierarchical model. By softening, we understand a metaconcept representing developments in political journalism that are observed on different levels of investigation, from journalism as a system (macrolevel) down to single media items (microlevel).

  November 16, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12102   open full text
• Unseen Disruptions and the Emergence of New Organizations.
  Matthew S. Weber.
  Communication Theory. November 16, 2016
  This article develops the theoretical process of organizational speciation to explain how certain new organizations are able to emerge and subsequently disrupt the organizational ecosystem by leveraging the blind spots of existing organizations. The process of organizational speciation addresses the means by which new organizations develop, compete for resources, and survive over time. As a theory of organizational communication, organizational speciation is particularly useful for understanding how rapid disruptions emerge. Changes in a number of industries are utilized to illustrate the process of speciation. This article lays a foundation for research examining how organizations understand and respond to rapid change.

  November 16, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12105   open full text
• Proposing the Communicate Bond Belong Theory: Evolutionary Intersections With Episodic Interpersonal Communication.
  Jeffrey A. Hall, Daniel Cochece Davis.
  Communication Theory. October 28, 2016
  The Communicate Bond Belong (CBB) theory is an evolutionary and motivational explanation of human communication's role in the relational functions of social interaction. CBB theory conceives of all social interactions as energy expending, but posits that only some social interactions are striving behaviors (i.e., actions taken to satiate a need). CBB theory proposes that social interaction operates within a homeostatic system, developed from internal pressures to satiate a need to belong, shaped by competing desires to invest and conserve social energy, and adaptable to new social circumstances and technological affordances. The theory bridges gaps among evolutionary and social psychology theories and interpersonal communication theories by attending to the multifunctional nature of everyday talk in relation to fundamental human needs.

  October 28, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12106   open full text
• Where Is the Critical Empirical Interpersonal Communication Research? A Roadmap for Future Inquiry into Discourse and Power.
  Julia Moore.
  Communication Theory. October 28, 2016
  Despite calls to integrate critical theory into interpersonal communication research over the past 25 years, and despite the considerable influence of critical theory in other communication subdisciplines, critical interpersonal communication research remains limited. I argue that poststructural theory, and specifically a Foucauldian orientation toward discourse and power, can provide scholars of interpersonal communication a novel yet disciplinarily grounded avenue for future critical empirical research. By providing a roadmap that traverses the history of critical thought in interpersonal communication, redirects key vocabulary, offers avenues for integrating critical theory into empirical research, and emphasizes pathways of critical qualitative inquiry, I contend that the subdiscipline of interpersonal communication will be enriched through attention to power in the discursive constitution of identities and relationships.

  October 28, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12107   open full text
• Extended Narrative Empathy: Poly‐Narratives and the Practice of Open Defecation.
  Robin Patric Clair, Rahul Rastogi, Ernest R. Blatchley, Rosalee A. Clawson, Charlotte Erdmann, Seungyoon Lee.
  Communication Theory. July 28, 2016
  After reviewing empathy, narrative, and narrative empathy, the three concepts are combined to create a communication theory—Extended Narrative Empathy (ENE). The theory supports expanding perspectives via the collection of a rich array of narratives that are not always in agreement (poly‐narratives). Empathy is required in order to see similar stories, peripheral stories, contentious stories, and antagonists as protagonists (via protagonist inversion) and overlapping of narratives as crucial to understanding complicated issues. The theory is discussed in light of open defecation in rural India.

  July 28, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12100   open full text
• The Sphere, the Screen, and the Square: “Locating” Occupy in the Public Sphere.
  Billie Murray.
  Communication Theory. July 28, 2016
  In this essay, I argue that considerations of public space are vital to scholars' theorizing of the public sphere. Discursive interactions, media spectacles, and social media use are all integral to social movement success, but an understanding of their interdependence with physical spaces is also essential to the maintenance of democratic participation. “Locating” Occupy in the public sphere through an exploration of its simultaneous occupation of public squares and public screens reveals the importance of public spaces in maintaining public spheres.

  July 28, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12101   open full text
• Unveiling the Biographies of Media: On the Role of Narratives, Anecdotes, and Storytelling in the Construction of New Media's Histories.
  Simone Natale.
  Communication Theory. July 08, 2016
  The article proposes the notion of “biographies of media” as a theoretical framework addressing how media change is domesticated through the construction of popular and personal narratives. Relying on theoretical approaches to storytelling and to the biographical genre, it argues that our relationship with media is shaped by efforts to insert them into recurring narrative patterns, through which their impact on our societies and everyday lives is represented and negotiated. Narratives about how media emerged, developed, and declined help people to make sense of new experiences and events, providing emotional and symbolic tools to cope with the transformations triggered by media change. The article also explores how such narratives may be employed by individuals and groups in support of political and ideological agendas.

  July 08, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12099   open full text
• Changing Power of Journalism: The Two Phases of Mediatization.
  Risto Kunelius, Esa Reunanen.
  Communication Theory. July 04, 2016
  Current conceptualizations of mediatization, particularly the mediatization of politics, stem largely from the imaginaries of the mass media era. This article questions the validity of these conceptualizations in the contemporary, more diffuse media environment. It argues that we are entering a new phase of mediatization in which journalism—as a core institution of the media—itself struggles with the effects of mediatization. Bringing together the discussions of mediatization and the “crisis of journalism,” the article suggests that a system theory based approach that understands mediatization as a process in which the construction of “public attention” changes its role in the coordination of institutional action can capture journalism's role both in the mass media era and in the present media environment.

  July 04, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12098   open full text
• “I Says to Myself, Says I”: Charles Sanders Peirce on the Components of Dialogue.
  Nathan Crick, Graham D. Bodie.
  Communication Theory. May 13, 2016
  Peirce famously defined the process of thinking as what a person is “‘saying to himself,’ that is, is saying to that other self that is just coming into life in the flow of time.” For Peirce, this meant the essence of thinking is dialogue. This essay proposes a conception of dialogue grounded in Peirce's normative ideal of inquiry that challenges contemporary thinking about dialogue yet supports the same moral and ethical aims. Using a scene from Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice that Peirce used as an exemplar of dialogue, we propose a conception that begins in doubt and passes through phases of reasoning and ethical and esthetic judgment before coming to a resolution which expands horizons of thought, emotion, and action.

  May 13, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12092   open full text
• Figurative Framing: Shaping Public Discourse Through Metaphor, Hyperbole, and Irony.
  Christian Burgers, Elly A. Konijn, Gerard J. Steen.
  Communication Theory. April 04, 2016
  Framing is an important concept in communication, yet many framing studies set out to develop frames relevant to only one issue. We expand framing theory by introducing figurative framing. We posit that figurative language types like metaphor, hyperbole and irony are important in shaping public discourse, because these figures contain important linguistic and conceptual content about the issue under discussion. We first explicate the role of each individual figure (metaphor, hyperbole, and irony) in the framing of important societal issues. Then, we focus on complex figurative frames (combinations of metaphor, hyperbole, and/or irony). The article concludes with a research agenda, connecting figurative framing to the four key processes in framing research (frame building, frame setting, individual‐level effects, and feedback loop).

  April 04, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12096   open full text
• Who Is Talking? Some Remarks on Nonhuman Agency in Communication.
  Till Jansen.
  Communication Theory. April 01, 2016
  Nonhuman agency has become an increasingly important issue in communication theory. While the approach proposed by the Montreal School has advanced research in the subject to a remarkable degree, it does not take reflexivity of actors into account. On the one hand, this makes the identification of actors to a certain degree arbitrary and the concept of actors too wide. On the other hand, it underestimates actors as it neglects actors' capacity to propose their own ontology. In order to cope with these issues while maintaining the notion of nonhuman agency as proposed by Cooren et al., I would like to propose a de‐ontologized notion of communication and agency based on the work of Gotthard Günther (e.g. 1976a, 1979a) and Niklas Luhmann.

  April 01, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12095   open full text
• Communication in the Fan of Disciplines.
  Barbie Zelizer.
  Communication Theory. April 01, 2016
  For as long as the modern research university has been around, finding an ordering principle for knowledge acquisition has been one of its key goals. Though the difficulties in ordering knowledge go back to the times of Plato, the modern research university's establishment was expected to resolve them. And yet, centuries later, that ordering principle still eludes us. Instead, the patterns by which we collect and organize knowledge remain out of step with the circumstances that typify today's university environment. This article addresses the evolution and impact of that dissonance, using the field of communication as a prism through which to consider whether recognition of alternate modes of knowledge acquisition might be possible and, equally important, overdue.

  April 01, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12094   open full text
• Communicating with Objects: Ontology, Object‐Orientations, and the Politics of Communication.
  Brenton J. Malin.
  Communication Theory. March 31, 2016
  This essay engages with recent work in Object‐Oriented Ontology, beginning with Alexander Galloway's claims that object‐oriented thought is inherently neoliberal. While I agree with Galloway's critique, his discussion demonstrates some shortcomings of ontological thinking in contemporary media and cultural studies. Building on my response to Galloway, I argue that the problems of object‐oriented thought have less to do with its dismissal of politics than with its problematic conception of objects themselves. In their strict avoidance of “the social,” object‐oriented thinkers ignore fundamentally important features of objects in general and media objects in particular. I conclude with suggestions toward an onto‐materialist theory of objects, which seeks to understand how political economic and other broadly social matter are ontologized in objects.

  March 31, 2016   doi: 10.1111/comt.12093   open full text
• Does it Matter Where You Read? Situating Narrative in Physical Environment.
  Anežka Kuzmičová.
  Communication Theory. December 22, 2015
  While language use in general is currently being explored as essentially situated in immediate physical environment, narrative reading is primarily regarded as a means of decoupling one's consciousness from the environment. In order to offer a more diversified view of narrative reading, the article distinguishes between 3 different roles the environment can play in the reading experience. Next to the traditional notion that environmental stimuli disrupt attention, the article proposes that they can also serve as a prop for mental imagery and/or a locus of pleasure more generally. The latter 2 perspectives presuppose a more clear‐cut distinction between consciousness and attention than typically assumed in the communication literature. The article concludes with a list of implications for research and practice.

  December 22, 2015   doi: 10.1111/comt.12084   open full text
• Connection Cues: Activating the Norms and Habits of Social Connectedness.
  Joseph B. Bayer, Scott W. Campbell, Rich Ling.
  Communication Theory. November 24, 2015
  Staying “connected” has become a societal norm and a personal habit. The goal of this article is to explain how individuals internalize—and activate—social connectedness during daily life. As such, we take a sociocognitive approach to integrate perspectives on implicit societal expectations (connection norms) and automatic individual behavior (connection habits). Based on this framework, we present a model for how nonconscious “triggers” to check a mobile device, or connection cues, affect the flow of communication. The model outlines types of connection cues, factors that moderate sensitivity to connection norms, and activation paths for connection habits. Altogether, connection cues determine when and where individuals “connect” through automatic perception.

  November 24, 2015   doi: 10.1111/comt.12090   open full text
• Curated Flows: A Framework for Mapping Media Exposure in the Digital Age.
  Kjerstin Thorson, Chris Wells.
  Communication Theory. November 23, 2015
  Advancing theory in media exposure and effects requires contending with an increasing level of complexity and contingency. Building on established theoretical concerns and the research possibilities enabled by large social datasets, we propose a framework for mapping information exposure of digitally situated individuals. We argue that from the perspective of an individual's personal communication network, comparable processes of “curation” are undertaken by a variety of actors—not only conventional newsmakers but also individual media users, social contacts, advertisers, and computer algorithms. Detecting the competition, intersection, and overlap of these flows is crucial to understanding media exposure and effects today. Our approach reframes research questions in debates such as polarization, selective and incidental exposure, participation, and conceptual orientations for computational approaches.

  November 23, 2015   doi: 10.1111/comt.12087   open full text
• Disidentifications Revisited: Queer(y)ing Intercultural Communication Theory.
  Shinsuke Eguchi, Godfried Asante.
  Communication Theory. November 20, 2015
  In this theoretical essay, we revisit Muñoz's (1999) highly influential theory of disidentifications to explore the potentiality of queer (of color) identities, performances, and politics in intercultural communication processes. We seek to interrogate the fluid and complex nuances of (dis)identifications with hegemonic relations of power, oppression, and privilege through our narratives as queer transnational/migrant men of color. By arguing that sexuality, sex/gender, and body function as significant facets of overall identity, we move forward to discuss larger implications of disidentifications to communication theory.

  November 20, 2015   doi: 10.1111/comt.12086   open full text
• Critical Regionalism and the Policies of Place: Revisiting Localism for the Digital Age.
  Christopher Ali.
  Communication Theory. November 20, 2015
  Local broadcasting is at a crossroads in Western media systems. While regulators work to address emergent challenges, an enduring tension within the discourse of local media regulation remains how to define “the local.” Stemming from the inability to meet this challenge, an artificial duality has emerged between communities of place and communities of interest within regulatory discussions. The larger epistemological question, therefore, remains undertheorized: How can we think through these issues in a productive fashion, rather than reducing them to an artificial dichotomy of spatial versus social? Through the use of illustrative instances from the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada, I argue that the neo‐Marxian theory of critical regionalism is a useful framework to approach this question.

  November 20, 2015   doi: 10.1111/comt.12091   open full text
• Feminist Dilemmatic Theorizing: New Materialism in Communication Studies.
  Kate Lockwood Harris.
  Communication Theory. November 04, 2015
  Feminist communication scholars often adopt seemingly incommensurate stances to navigate tensions among agency, discourse, materiality, and history. I argue that valuing these “contradictions” is a hallmark of feminist communication research, a tradition I label feminist dilemmatic theorizing. Because feminists seek to describe and transform the world, they employ constitutive and representative understandings of communication. Rather than assert these approaches as paradoxical, I reread existing scholarship for nascent feminist new materialisms. Using sexual violence as an example, I argue that feminist communication theory develops a distinct approach to the force of communication, one in which discourse is not all‐powerful. Accordingly, I suggest communication theorists draw upon existing feminist scholarship to meet critiques of social construction and develop a material turn.

  November 04, 2015   doi: 10.1111/comt.12083   open full text
• Aristotelian Casuistry: Getting into the Thick of Global Media Ethics.
  Sandra L. Borden.
  Communication Theory. November 04, 2015
  I argue that much moral disagreement between cultures centers on what metaethicists call “thick concepts,” such as cruelty and courage. The main question I will address is “What are the advantages of combining virtue ethics with casuistry for addressing thick concepts central to media ethics disagreements between cultures?” A related secondary question is “How does this framework compare with ‘global media ethics’ approaches that prioritize thin concepts, such as ‘right’ and ‘ought?’” I will argue that the virtue/casuistry combination: (a) preserves the contexts that give thick ethical concepts their meaning; (b) conceives of moral agents as situated selves and confirms the value of moral expertise; and (c) presses for closure while resisting codification.

  November 04, 2015   doi: 10.1111/comt.12085   open full text
• Metajournalistic Discourse and the Meanings of Journalism: Definitional Control, Boundary Work, and Legitimation.
  Matt Carlson.
  Communication Theory. November 04, 2015
  Situating journalism as a cultural practice charged with delivering valid accounts of the world necessitates a theory of metajournalistic discourse to explain how meanings around journalism develop. Through metajournalistic discourse, various actors inside and outside of journalism compete to construct, reiterate, and even challenge the boundaries of acceptable journalistic practices and the limits of what can or cannot be done. Based on the premises that journalism is variable, reliant on context, and produced through social relationships, this article develops a theory of metajournalistic discourse that connects three components—actors, sites/audiences, and topics—to processes of definition making, boundary work, and legitimation.

  November 04, 2015   doi: 10.1111/comt.12088   open full text
• How Technology Encourages Political Selective Exposure.
  Ivan B. Dylko.
  Communication Theory. November 04, 2015
  This article focuses on customizability technology and its implications for the Selective Exposure Theory. 2 important dimensions of customizability technology (i.e., user‐driven vs. system‐driven, and topic‐based vs. ideology‐based) are explicated. The potential relationship between these customizability dimensions and selective exposure is discussed. 2 models of customizability effects are developed incorporating various user‐level and content‐level variables, providing a detailed roadmap for future research on customizability technology. Theoretical implications of customizability technology beyond its effects on selective exposure are also discussed.

  November 04, 2015   doi: 10.1111/comt.12089   open full text
• Beyond the Individualism–Collectivism Divide to Relationalism: Explicating Cultural Assumptions in the Concept of “Relationships”.
  R. S. Zaharna.
  Communication Theory. April 28, 2015
  While the basic concept of “relationship” is pivotal to research and theory across a spectrum of communication studies, cultural assumptions about this basic concept may vary significantly, and yet escape scholars' awareness. This study exposes assumptions buried in foundational U.S.‐based Organization‐Public Relationship (OPR) scholarship to illustrate how differing assumptions about “relationships” correspond to understandings of communication processes and goals. “Relationalism” is introduced as an analytical lens to provide insights beyond the dichotomous relational patterns of individualism‐collectivism, explore global perspectives, and help explicate a graduated range of relational assumptions that challenge OPR theoretical premises. Relational assumptions identified in OPR scholarship have heuristic value for communication areas that have “relationships” as a pivotal concept.

  April 28, 2015   doi: 10.1111/comt.12058   open full text
• In Pursuit of Play: Toward a Social Cognitive Understanding of Determinants of Digital Play.
  Frederik De Grove, Verolien Cauberghe, Jan Van Looy.
  Communication Theory. April 08, 2014
  Over the years, reasons for playing digital games have been studied from a variety of perspectives. A systematic, theoretically and empirically grounded conceptual framework which takes into account the specificity of gaming as a contextualized social, rule‐based, narrative, and systemic practice has hitherto been lacking however. This paper proposes such a framework based on social cognitive theory and elaborated on by means of 37 in‐depth interviews. Understanding digital play is conceptualized as a reciprocal system of play behavior, individual factors, and environmental aspects. This approach offers a flexible framework for understanding determinants of playing games in a variety of contexts while taking into account the specific characteristics of the medium.

  April 08, 2014   doi: 10.1111/comt.12030   open full text
• Advancing Warranting Theory.
  David C. DeAndrea.
  Communication Theory. April 08, 2014
  Since its introduction by Walther and Parks (2002), warranting has emerged in the literature as a prominent construct that offers insight for understanding how online self‐presentations are produced and evaluated. This manuscript outlines limitations that exist in the literature on warranting and provides suggestions for how the construct can be advanced theoretically and tested empirically. Notably, testable theoretical propositions are derived that specify how various factors are anticipated to affect perceptions of warranting value. In addition, warranting theory is compared and contrasted to Donath's (2007) adaptation of signaling theory and previous work on impression management.

  April 08, 2014   doi: 10.1111/comt.12033   open full text
• Communicating Imperfection: The Ethical Principles of News Corrections.
  Zohar Kampf, Efrat Daskal.
  Communication Theory. April 08, 2014
  By exploring 2 sets of ethical values, we suggest a theoretical framework for understanding media accountability products. The first set is exclusive to the field of journalism and consists of distinctive values (accuracy, balance, etc.). The second set is nonexclusive, crossing professional fields, and consists of principles for communicating organizational imperfection (responsibility, transparency, and relationality). On the basis of this theoretical construction we formulate an empirical model for assessing products of accountability. The model was applied to 1,458 corrections published in a representative newspaper from Israel, the United States, and the United Kingdom ranging in their levels of adherence to a formal accountability policy. We conclude by asking how the expectations from news organizations to adhere to principles of accountability may be realized.

  April 08, 2014   doi: 10.1111/comt.12035   open full text
• The Interaction of Affective Dispositions, Moral Judgments, and Intentionality in Assessing Narrative Characters: Rationalist and Intuitionist Sequences.
  Tae Kyoung Lee, Michael A. Shapiro.
  Communication Theory. April 08, 2014
  Several theories, including disposition‐based theories, depend on moral judgments about narrative characters' actions to describe how audiences understand characters in media narratives. However, more needs to be known about how moral judgments about characters' actions are made and affective dispositions toward characters are formed and change as a story unfolds. There is evidence that the intentionality underlying a character's actions is an important judgment that audiences use to understand a character's actions. We propose two sequences: a rationalist sequence in which perceived intentionality of a character's actions informs moral judgments and affective dispositions, and an intuitionist sequence in which affective dispositions are determined first and moral and intentionality judgments are made congruent with that judgment. Implications for narrative theories are discussed.

  April 08, 2014   doi: 10.1111/comt.12031   open full text
• Perceived Speech Conditions and Disagreement of Everyday Talk: A Proceduralist Perspective of Citizen Deliberation.
  Weiyu Zhang, Leanne Chang.
  Communication Theory. April 08, 2014
  Motivated by the theoretical debate on whether everyday talk qualifies as part of the deliberative system, this study employed 2 middle‐range concepts, perceived speech conditions and disagreement, to theorize the deliberativeness of everyday talk based on a proceduralist perspective. Perceived disagreement is incorporated into the definition of deliberation as a starting point of the procedure. Three dimensions of perceived speech conditions, including free proposal, symmetrical opportunity, and fair treatment, are conceptualized as the procedural treatments deliberation offers. Using a hybrid political system as the context, an empirical examination illustrates how the 2 concepts can help delineate the perceptions of deliberative from nondeliberative everyday talk, as well as how the deliberative dimension in everyday speech can facilitate political efficacy.

  April 08, 2014   doi: 10.1111/comt.12034   open full text
• Listening, Hearing, Sensing: Three Modes of Being and the Phenomenology of Charles Sanders Peirce.
  Graham D. Bodie, Nathan Crick.
  Communication Theory. April 08, 2014
  This article accepts Lipari's invitation to continue rethinking communication along the lines of artful listening as understood through the lens of phenomenology. However, we trace out the implications following a different phenomenological tradition than the one stemming from the German tradition of Heidegger and Husserl—specifically, the phenomenology of Charles Sanders Peirce, who allows us to see listening differently and perhaps more clearly. The primary contribution from Peirce's phenomenology is the logos he uses to extract 3 fundamental categories of thought and nature: Firstness (Quality), Secondness (Relation), and Thirdness (Mediation). As we shall show, listening is characterized by a plural consciousness sensitive to Mediation as it reveals itself through Relation and Quality.

  April 08, 2014   doi: 10.1111/comt.12032   open full text
• Social Democracy or Corporate Libertarianism? Conflicting Media Policy Narratives in the Wake of Market Failure.
  Victor Pickard.
  Communication Theory. August 02, 2013
  Assuming that crucial public services should not be left entirely to market‐driven forces, American policymakers attempted to establish safeguards for news media. An examination of conflicting narratives within postwar policy debates suggests that the US evaded this path largely because of a concerted backlash—often in the form of red‐baiting—encouraged by threatened newspaper and broadcast industries. Many lessons, parallels, and forgotten antecedents for current American media policy can be drawn from the postwar 1940s. Thus, it is instructive to explore how these earlier debates were framed, particularly in response to what might be referred to as “market failure.” Given the worsening journalism crisis and other persistent media policy challenges, this analysis of market failure holds much contemporary relevance.

  August 02, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12021   open full text
• Presidents as Priests: Toward a Typology of Christian Discourse in the American Presidency.
  Kevin Coe, Sarah Chenoweth.
  Communication Theory. July 11, 2013
  This study contributes to the scholarship on political and religious communication by deriving from key theoretical works a typology of Christian discourse. We employ this typology in a computer‐assisted content analysis of presidential communication across 3 decades. Developing an argument about the manner in which changing religious identification in America might influence presidential discourse, we expect and find that presidents prefer abstract to concrete religious discourse and that Barack Obama's Christian discourse has differed from that of his predecessors. Situating these findings within 2 theories of religion in public life—secularization and pluralism—we suggest that recent shifts in presidential discourse signal a move toward greater pluralism.

  July 11, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12020   open full text
• From Transformational Leadership to Leadership Trans‐Formations: A Critical Dialogic Perspective.
  Rahul Mitra.
  Communication Theory. July 11, 2013
  Noting overlaps between leadership and transformation processes, I outline a critical digital perspective that shifts focus from transformational leadership behaviors to how leadership “trans‐formations” occur. Specifically, this article avers that naming particular identities, processes, and concepts by leaders and change participants enacts transformation. These three domains are “co‐named” by leaders and participants in ongoing communicative sequences of acting/re‐acting, attuned to the discursive flows and material conditions/actants shaping various contexts. I illustrate this framework via the U.S.‐based climate change nonprofit 350.org and its founder Bill McKibben, focusing on how leaders or participants acquire and mobilize voice, organize in different forms, and how “new” forms intersect with traditional institutions. Implications for leadership, dialogue, and practical accomplishments of transformation are discussed.

  July 11, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12022   open full text
• Communicative Constructivism and Mediatization.
  Hubert Knoblauch.
  Communication Theory. July 08, 2013
  The article (a) proposes communicative constructivism as a theoretical framework for conceptualizing mediatization. Communicative constructivism elaborates social constructivism and links it to Habermas' theory of communicative action. By highlighting the neglected role of objectivations, it allows the recognition of knowledge, body, performance, and objects as part of communicative action. Communicative action results in communicative forms which constitute the institutions of the communicative culture of society. Linking actions and objects, mediatization is (b) part of any communicative action. As communication cultures vary with respect to the forms of communication, contemporary society can be defined by certain features of mediatization. Since these features are to be determined empirically, the article will (c) hint at their consequences for the diagnosis of contemporary society.

  July 08, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12018   open full text
• Media Logic, Social Control, and Fear.
  David L. Altheide.
  Communication Theory. July 08, 2013
  The role of mediated communication and media logic in social order is discussed, along with recent examples involving social media and popular culture, surveillance, commercialism and marketing, social change and revolution, and military strategies and weapon systems. The relevance of an ecology of communication—the structure, organization, and accessibility of information technology, various forums, media, and channels of information—is proposed as a template for inspecting the interaction of social context, information technology, communication formats, and how these affect social activities. Suggestions are offered for continued investigation and mapping of media logic across information technologies in order to clarify the reflexive relationship between communication, social interaction, and institutional orders.

  July 08, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12017   open full text
• A Culturalist Approach to the Concept of the Mediatization of Politics: The Age of “Media Hegemony”.
  Elena Block.
  Communication Theory. June 25, 2013
  This article rethinks the concept of the mediatization of politics from a culturalist perspective, rebuilding the concept through five arguments: the first two are focused on the symbolic dimension of the issue in the context of the naturalized hegemonic media; the third presents it as a conceptual tool helpful to study the way citizens increasingly interact with media technologies and forms to engage with politics; the fourth poses it as a state of affairs where individuals and groups develop cultural patterns of media connectivity that lead to politically mediatized situations; the last proposes this state of affairs as the “fourth age” of political communication: An age of media hegemony. Hugo Chávez's politically mediatized Venezuela serves as an illustration.

  June 25, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12016   open full text
• Rethinking the Logics: A Conceptual Framework for the Mediatization of Politics.
  Nino Landerer.
  Communication Theory. June 19, 2013
  This article suggests a conceptual framework for the mediatization of politics. It critically discusses the concepts of “media logic” and “political logic” emanating from the political communication literature and argues that “normative logic” and “market logic” are more appropriate concepts for the theoretical understanding and empirical analysis of the behavior of mass media and political actors. These two logics guide media and political actors' issue selection and presentation to different degrees. The mediatization of politics in this account takes place when both media and political actors adapt their behavior to the audience‐oriented market logic. This process works in parallel with the economic integration and technological progress comprised by the term globalization, thereby challenging established institutional mechanisms in advanced democracies.

  June 19, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12013   open full text
• Definitive and Sensitizing Conceptualizations of Mediatization.
  Klaus Bruhn Jensen.
  Communication Theory. June 19, 2013
  Departing from H. Blumer's (1954) distinction between definitive and sensitizing concepts, this article suggests that the mediatization literature has overemphasized definitive approaches to conceptualizing media change. Analyzing 2 representative instances, and comparing them with 3 sensitizing approaches, the article argues that future research should clarify several processes entering into mediatization, including social structuration, technological momentum, and the embedding of communication into social contexts as well as physical objects. In conclusion, the essay notes that greater attention to the ongoing digitalization of the contemporary media environment could help both to explain the timing of the turn to mediatization in communication research and to focus future theorizing about the very idea of mediatization.

  June 19, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12014   open full text
• Mediatization and Social Space: Reconstructing Mediatization for the Transmedia Age.
  André Jansson.
  Communication Theory. June 18, 2013
  Inspired by Henri Lefebvre's triadic model of social space, this article reconstructs mediatization as a sociospatial concept. Such a reconstruction corresponds to a holistic, nonmedia‐centric view of mediatization, and provides an analytical framework for generating complex and critical understandings of the media's role in the production of social space. Mediatization is defined in terms of 3 sociospatial regimes of dependence, which can be applied to different domains of society: (1) material indispensability and adaptation, (2) premediation of experience, and (3) normalization of social practice. Focusing on everyday life, the article outlines how the articulations of these regimes shift with the social integration of so‐called transmedia technologies, and advances a critical humanistic research agenda for approaching the social consequences of mediatization.

  June 18, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12015   open full text
• The Habermasian Public Sphere and Exclusion: An Engagement with Poststructuralist‐Influenced Critics.
  Lincoln Dahlberg.
  Communication Theory. June 05, 2013
  One trenchant critique of the Habermasian public sphere conception, voiced particularly strongly by poststructuralist‐influenced critics, is that it fails to fully account for exclusion. In this article I examine the strength of this critique. I begin by demonstrating how Habermasians have in many ways already theorized public sphere exclusion. Given this, I ask what is left of the poststructuralist-inspired critique. I argue that what is left is a deep disagreement with Habermasians about the grounding of the public sphere conception. I subsequently ask what difference, and moreover what positive contribution, a poststructuralist (rather than a Habermasian) grounding can make for understanding public sphere exclusion and associated politics.

  June 05, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12010   open full text
• Communication Infrastructure Theory and Entertainment‐Education: An Integrative Model for Health Communication.
  Ioana Literat, Nien‐Tsu Nancy Chen.
  Communication Theory. June 05, 2013
  This article suggests a hybrid model for entertainment‐education, where the integrated activation of communication channels across different levels of influence can increase the reach and effectiveness of entertainment‐education campaigns. The synergy between communication infrastructure theory (CIT) and entertainment‐education offers a systematic, integrated and collaborative approach to augment campaign exposure, and represents a promising way to reach at‐risk communities with critical health messages. By taking advantage of micro‐, meso‐ and macrolevel opportunities to improve campaign reach, as described in this model, entertainment‐education producers can capitalize on the interconnected storytelling network upon which their target communities rely for the fulfillment of their everyday goals.

  June 05, 2013   doi: 10.1111/comt.12011   open full text