Conference Agenda

Central question

What is the role of memory in communication effects?

Conversation starters

1. Communication studies often use recall or recognition as proxies for attention or manipulation checks rather than treating memory as an active cognitive process. Which parallel threads of memory research across communication and psychology could be consolidated to isolate the field’s core conceptual concerns?
2. How can we operationalize memory across communication subfields? When are recall and recognition appropriate, when should other paradigms be used, and what do those measurement choices mean for models of message and media processing?

Where the conversation is headed

A roadmap for integrating memory into communication research.

Suggested reading

• Braun-Latour, K. A., & Zaltman, G. (2006). Memory change: An intimate measure of persuasion. Journal of Advertising Research, 46(1), 57–72.
• Furman, O., Dorfman, N., Hasson, U., Davachi, L., & Dudai, Y. (2007). They saw a movie: Long-term memory for an extended audiovisual narrative. Learning & Memory, 14(6), 457–467.
• Lepsius, M. (2026). The brain edits the past: Neural systems of memory reconstruction and self-stability. New Ideas in Psychology, 80, 101221.
• Shehata, A., Thomas, F., Glogger, I., & Andersen, K. (2024). Belief maintenance as a media effect: A conceptualization and empirical approach. Human Communication Research, 50(1), 1–13.

Central question

How do support gaps emerge through communication within and across relationships?

Conversation starters

1. What individual, relational, situational, and cultural factors shape support desires? How should we theoretically distinguish desired support from expected support, and to what extent are desires formed prior to interaction versus reconstructed through communication itself?
2. While support gap research often focuses on individual recipients’ perceptions, supportive communication is inherently interactive. How do support gaps emerge as dyadic, two-way communication processes involving both the provider’s behaviors and the recipient’s responses?
3. What theoretical mechanisms explain why support deficits and surpluses produce distinct consequences for personal and relational well-being? Under what specific conditions is exact matching optimal, versus an optimal support surplus?
4. How do support gaps evolve across conversation moves, coping episodes, and broader relational trajectories, and how are they created or mitigated across a person’s broader relational network?

Suggested reading

• Crowley, J. L., & High, A. C. (2020). Validating the support gaps framework: Longitudinal effects and moderators of experiencing deficits and surpluses during supportive interactions. Communication Quarterly, 68(1), 29–53.
• Pederson, J. R., High, A. C., & McLaren, R. M. (2020). Support gaps surrounding conversations about coping with relational transgressions. Western Journal of Communication, 84(2), 204–226.
• Youngvorst, L. J., & Ruppel, E. K. (2025). Social support among emerging adult friends: Dyadic and longitudinal associations between support gaps and relational quality. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 42(7), 1629–1656.

Central question

How can existing CMC theories and concepts inform our understanding of AIMC, and what new theoretical questions and concepts should AIMC research address that may not have been central to traditional CMC research?

Conversation starters

1. Do we need to reinvent our theories every time a new technology emerges? Why or why not?
2. What role does AI play in your research, now or in the future? Does it challenge any theories or assumptions you work with?
3. If you had to choose, is AI’s overall impact on interpersonal communication more positive or negative? Why?
4. Which interpersonal communication or CMC theories or concepts are useful for understanding AIMC, and which most need reconsideration? Why?
5. What theoretical questions or concepts become more important in AIMC than they were in traditional CMC research?

Suggested reading

• Hancock, J. T., Naaman, M., & Levy, K. (2020). AI-mediated communication: Definition, research agenda, and ethical considerations. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 25(1), 89–100.
• Liu, B., Liu, J., & Wei, L. (2026). Thinking, fast, and artificial: Processing fluency in AI-mediated relational maintenance planning and its impact on relationship perceptions. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 31(4), zmag018.
• Zhu, R., Markowitz, D. M., & Van Der Heide, B. (2026). Presenting the augmented self: Extending sender effects of the hyperpersonal model in artificial intelligence-mediated communication. Annals of the International Communication Association, wlag029.

Central question

As AI-mediated content, algorithmic curation, and synthetic media reshape how political information is produced and consumed, how will our conceptualization of “political communication” evolve, who (or what) will count as a communicator under that new conceptualization, and what questions will become central to what these developments mean for democratic processes?

Conversation starters

1. The authorship question: When a political message is drafted by an AI, personalized by an algorithm, and delivered through a synthetic avatar, who is accountable for its content: the candidate, the platform, the AI developer, or the voter who engaged with it?
2. Fragmentation vs. fusion: Are we heading toward further fragmentation of political (and even non-political) publics through hyper-personalized feeds and niche communities, or a strange re-fusion around a handful of AI-mediated gatekeepers such as chatbots and recommendation engines? What evidence points each way? Does the field need to reconsider Postman’s thesis that current trends further facilitate the potential that we “amuse ourselves to death”?
3. Trust infrastructure: Traditional trust signals (bylines, institutional mastheads, “I’m a real journalist”) are eroding as synthetic content becomes indistinguishable from human-made content. What new trust infrastructures, technical, social, or regulatory, might replace them? What are the implications for epistemic trust?
4. The global asymmetry: Most political communication research and platform policy is built around U.S. and Western contexts. How might the futures we imagine look different in electoral democracies with weaker institutions, different media systems, or non-English-dominant information ecosystems? Which systems are best positioned to weather what is coming, if any?
5. The future of democracy: As rapidly accelerating technologies reshape what counts as political communication, how should research agendas evolve to consider the implications for the exercise of, and support for, democratic systems?

Where the conversation is headed

Recommendations for new research areas, such as comparative platform research on how different regulatory approaches (the EU AI Act, national deepfake laws) shape political communication on the ground; AI-mediated persuasion at the “micro-targeting 2.0” level of real-time, conversational persuasion via chatbots and voice assistants; and political communication in non-Western, non-English information ecosystems.

Suggested reading

• Young, D. G., & Miller, J. M. (2023). Political communication. In L. Huddy et al. (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of political psychology (3rd ed., pp. 555–600). Oxford University Press.
• Lawrence, R. G. (2025). Editor’s note, January 2025. Political Communication, 42(1), 1–5.

Central question

How does our understanding of online hate change when we study it as an unfolding communication process rather than primarily as hateful content?

Conversation starters

1. If hateful content is only one part of the communication process, what else should online hate research examine?
2. Who are the relevant actors and audiences in online hate, and how should we understand their roles?
3. How does feedback to online hate, and from whom, influence subsequent behaviors?
4. What social and relational outcomes can emerge from online hate as a communication process?
5. What theories and methods are needed to study online hate as a dynamic communication process?

Where the conversation is headed

Identify key questions and develop a research agenda for studying how online hate unfolds through interaction, feedback, and relational outcomes.

Suggested reading

• Walther, J. B. (2025). Making a case for a social processes approach to online hate. In J. B. Walther & R. E. Rice (Eds.), Social processes of online hate (pp. 9–36). Routledge.
• Matthes, J., Koban, K., Bührer, S., Kirchmair, T., Weiss, P., Khaleghipour, M., Saumer, M., & Meerson, R. (2026). The state of evidence in digital hate research: An umbrella review. Communication Research, 53(6), 867–896.
• Walther, J. B. (2026). The effects of social approval signals on the production of online hate: A theoretical explication. Communication Research, 53(6), 751–777.

Central question

How should researchers use mediation analysis in ways that account for experimental design, random assignment, and induced variance while maintaining the possibility of falsification?

Conversation starters

1. In a simple randomized experiment: (a) What relationship should we expect between X and Y, if X has no effect on Y? (b) How is variance in Y partitioned into variance associated with experimental condition and residual variance, and what role does random assignment play in interpreting that partition? (c) What does a significant observed X-Y relationship mean in this context, and what inference can be made?
2. Suppose a theory proposes that M causes Y. Researchers decide to test this causal relationship by manipulating a message feature X to induce different levels of M. (a) What role does measuring M play in testing this theory? (b) What does the strength of the effect of X on M imply for the model? (c) If the hypothesized X→M→Y causal chain is correct, what relationships should we observe among X, M, and Y? (d) What does the model assume about the residuals of M and Y, and what would nonindependence of those residuals imply?
3. When a direct X-Y path is included in the mediation model: (a) What variance is removed from the estimation of the M-Y path? (b) What variation in M is then used to estimate the M-Y path? (c) How does this change the meaning of the M-Y path and the indirect effect?
4. How does including or excluding the direct X-Y path affect the falsifiability of the hypothesized X→M→Y causal chain? What can the fit or misfit of a model that excludes the direct X-Y path tell us that a fully saturated mediation model cannot?
5. Given the inferential purpose of an experiment, what standards should researchers follow when designing, analyzing, interpreting, and reporting experimental mediation studies so that the hypothesized causal chain remains falsifiable?

Where the conversation is headed

A preliminary set of practical standards for designing, analyzing, interpreting, and reporting experimental mediation studies in ways that maintain the possibility of falsification and identify boundary conditions, along with areas of disagreement and unresolved methodological questions.

Suggested reading

• Grizzard, M., Carpenter, C. J., & Frazer, R. (2026; pre-print). Concerning the c′ Path: How PROCESS-based Mediation Undermines Experimental Methods. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/39uqf_v1
• O'Keefe, D. J. (2003). Message properties, mediating states, and manipulation checks: Claims, evidence, and data analysis in experimental persuasive message effects research. Communication Theory, 13(3), 251–274. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2885.2003.tb00292.x

Central question

How do we make sure we are getting the science right and the training right?

Conversation starters

1. Think of one time you used AI in your research and weren’t sure it was okay. What was the task, and what made you hesitate?
2. What is the best paper our field currently cannot write? If a question were unaskable only because it was too big, what would you go after?
3. Would you rather train in a lab that treats offloading writing as offloading thinking, or one that treats learning these tools as part of scientific training? Which lab would you rather hire from?
4. Your student can produce three papers this year using AI, or one without. What should they do?
5. For graduate students: What does AI make better, and what does it make worse?
6. For post-PhD researchers: What does AI make better, and what does it make worse?

Central question

How can communication researchers study AI chatbots for mental health in ways that are theoretically grounded, practically effective, and ethically responsible?

Conversation starters

1. What communication theories can inform mental health chatbot research?
2. How should researchers design and implement chatbot interactions, including expert input, prompt development, and language model selection?
3. How should we evaluate whether a mental health chatbot actually works?
4. What safeguards are necessary when participants interact with mental health chatbots, including IRB disclosure, data monitoring, and procedures for responding to unintended harms or adverse events?
5. What does rigorous and transparent research practice look like when the technology is constantly changing?

Where the conversation is headed

Develop a practical research and design roadmap organized around four stages: ground the research, build the interaction, protect participants, and evaluate and report.

Central question

If the discipline of Communication were to embrace Creating Understanding as the fundamental goal of communication, how would that affect undergraduate and graduate education, research agendas, and the discipline’s relationship to natural science?

Conversation starters

1. If understanding is a state of neurological alignment, how should graduate curricula expand to prepare the next generation of researchers?
2. Does an emphasis on creating understanding suggest new paradigms for research?
3. Is there any warrant for claiming that Communication should be considered a natural science first and a social science second?

Where the conversation is headed

Disruption with the potential for transition.

Suggested reading

• Chapters 2 and 3 of Creating Understanding.

Central question

To what extent are metaphors useful for theoretical progress in communication science?

Conversation starters

1. What does scientific progress look like in communication science? What are we trying to progress in theorizing (e.g., predictive power, explanatory power, question generation, parsimony, etc.)? To what extent can metaphors be useful for theoretical progress?
2. To what extent are metaphors useful for advancing our goals for scientific progress? What are common metaphors that have been used in theorizing communication, and do they generally tend toward Borgian Map explanations of communication phenomena? Are there empirical or theoretical conditions that necessitate using metaphors as a surrogate reasoning system? Are there communication phenomena where a Borgian Map may actually be epistemically beneficial?
3. Aside from metaphors, what other surrogate systems in communication science might enable or constrain progress? What are common surrogate systems used in the discipline and its different subfields?
4. If not metaphors, what other approaches might overcome or complement the utility of metaphors in theorizing communication?

Suggested reading

• Borges, J. L. (1946/1998). On exactitude in science (A. Hurley, Trans.). In A. Hurley (Trans.), Collected fictions (p. 325). Penguin Books. https://kwarc.info/teaching/TDM/Borges.pdf

Central question

How do researchers correct the literature when the research has gone off course, ignoring the variables measured and the established working components of the theory?

Conversation starters

1. What role do we have as communication scholars to hold ourselves accountable for the theoretical drift occurring?
2. What is the best course of action to correct published literature that does not measure the established theoretical variables?
3. How do we address theoretical propositions woven into the literature as proven findings rather than claims about what might occur?

Central question

How can a theory of marginalizing messages be tested and used in different contexts?

Conversation starters

1. What constructs are similar to marginalizing messages, where do they overlap, and what makes marginalizing messages unique?
2. What would it look like to test this theory, and which existing measures could be useful?
3. To which communication contexts could the theory be applied, and what adaptations would be needed?
4. How could the propositions be represented in a figure? What makes for a useful visual in a theory piece?
5. Using DeAndrea and Holbert’s table as a starting point, how could areas of weakness in the theory be strengthened?

Where the conversation is headed

Sketch a research agenda for a systematic program of testing, extending, and applying the theory of marginalizing messages.

Suggested reading

• Dorrance Hall, E., & Wilson, S. R. (2021). Explicating the dimensions and types of marginalized family members. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 38(7), 2099–2120.
• Dorrance Hall, E., & Gettings, P. (2020). ‘Who is this little girl they hired to work here?’: Women’s experiences of marginalizing communication in male-dominated workplaces. Communication Monographs, 87(4), 484–505.

Central question

What is a useful definition and (perhaps) operationalization for narrative in communication science?

Conversation starters

1. What constitutes the smallest meaningful and measurable unit of a narrative? What are its necessary and sufficient components?
2. How do our definitions of narrative serve different hierarchical levels of our research questions, both at the moment-to-moment (local) and broader story-structure (global) levels? Do the different levels affect how we characterize these components?
3. What would a systems-level characterization of a theory of narrative experience look like in terms of how we specify its components, relations, environment, and evolution? How could we characterize internal dependencies across these units (e.g., multilevel networks)?
4. Where is most communication research situated currently? Can we organize narrative research into buckets at different timescales?

Where the conversation is headed

Highlight a gap in current research on narratives and generate productive directions for researchers considering narratives at all levels in their work. The group may also develop the discussion into a research article on narratives in communication science.

Suggested reading

• A handout with definitions will be provided.

Central question

In what ways can different forms of AI (predictive, perceptual, generative, decisional, optimization, organizational, and robotic AI; Pilny et al., 2025) enhance or disrupt organizational processes and the employee experience?

Conversation starters

1. What are the advantages and disadvantages of organizations using AI to socialize newcomers?
2. Will AI make employee performance appraisals more accurate, helpful, and acceptable to employees than their present performance appraisal systems?
3. What are the potential uses for AI in facilitating successful organizational change?

Where the conversation is headed

Refined directions for research and possible research collaborations.

Suggested reading

• Liu, Y., Ding, H., Yu, E., & Song, K. (2026). Navigating onboarding in the artificial intelligence (AI) era: How augmentation-based AI usage shapes newcomers’ organizational socialization. Current Psychology, 45(1073), 1–15.
• Pilny, A., Endacott, C., & Treem, J. (2025). AI in the workplace. Wiley.
• Xie, W., & Xiao, Q. (2026). “Your first colleague might be an AI”: Bridging functional value and affective trust for theorizing AI avatars in new-employee organizational socialization. International Journal of Human–Computer Interaction, 1–31.

Central question

What does it mean for communication science to study children and AI primarily through a deficit lens? What questions, methods, and forms of knowledge does that lens make harder to see?

Conversation starters

1. What do we lose, as a field, by treating risk, harm, or vulnerability as the default variable of interest in research on children and AI?
2. What methods exist (or do not) for treating children as agents in AI research, rather than primarily as subjects of protection?
3. Why has a deficit lens been so much easier for the field to build on than one centered on children’s agency?
4. If you don’t study children directly, has your own field faced a similar pull toward framing a population as vulnerable rather than capable? What made that framing hard to move past?

Where the conversation is headed

A working sketch of a research agenda for studying children and AI, naming concrete questions, methods, or approaches for the field to pursue.

Suggested reading

• Buckingham, D., & Strandgaard Jensen, H. (2012). Beyond “media panics”: Reconceptualising public debates about children and media. Journal of Children and Media, 6(4), 413–429.
• Entman, R. M. (1993). Framing: Toward clarification of a fractured paradigm. Journal of Communication, 43(4), 51–58.

Central question

Is there an empirical crisis for communication theory, and if so, what can be done to mitigate risk and produce empirically adequate theories?

Conversation starters

1. Do we have undead theories, or is the concern misplaced?
2. Do theories even need empirical support, and does falsification work in practice?
3. Care to name names?
4. Which of the proposed solutions resonate with you?
5. What solutions should be added to the list?

Central question

Where should we draw the line between a doctoral student’s private research process and GenAI use that should be disclosed to an advisor or collaborator?

Conversation starters

1. What should actually determine whether GenAI use requires disclosure: the amount of AI involvement, the intellectual significance of the task, the consequences of error, authorship, or something else?
2. What do we mean by ‘independent scholarship’ when researchers routinely rely on tools, collaborators, editors, software, and now generative AI? Is AI meaningfully different from those other forms of assistance, and if so, why?
3. Does an advisor have a legitimate claim to know how a student uses GenAI on independently authored work, or does that cross into unnecessary oversight of the student’s research process?
4. What changes when the advisor becomes a coauthor? Does authorship create a stronger right to know because responsibility for the integrity of the work is now shared?
5. Can disclosure be considered genuinely voluntary when the person receiving that disclosure also evaluates the student’s competence, progress, and future opportunities?

Where the conversation is headed

Identify the main factors that should shape GenAI disclosure decisions, clarify where people draw the line between a student’s own research process and shared responsibility with an advisor or collaborator, and surface areas of agreement, differing norms, and questions doctoral programs still need to address.

Suggested reading

• A one-page table memo, preliminary findings, and selected theory readings will be provided at the session.

Central question

Is selective exposure a law of communication?

Conversation starters

1. Is the principle of selective exposure evident in every function of communication?
2. What are the underlying mechanisms that motivate or restrict (guide) selective exposure?
3. Is selective exposure evident in dozens of psychological and communication theories, just under different construct labels?
4. What novel avenues of research are unlocked by this paradigm shift?

Where the conversation is headed

Selective exposure is not merely a media or political communication phenomenon. It is evident across the various functions of communication: relating, informing, influencing, and entertaining. We argue that across all these domains, selective exposure is explained by humans’ limited cognitive-emotional capacity.

Suggested reading

• Fisher, J. T., Huskey, R., Keene, J. R., & Weber, R. (2018). The limited capacity model of motivated mediated message processing: Looking to the future. Annals of the International Communication Association, 42(4), 291–315.
• Knobloch-Westerwick, S. (2015). The selective exposure self-and affect-management (SESAM) model: Applications in the realms of race, politics, and health. Communication Research, 42(7), 959–985.
• Schmälzle, R., & Huskey, R. (2023). Skyhooks, cranes, and the construct dump: A comment on and extension of Boster (2023). Asian Communication Research, 20(2), 84–94.