About the course

Led by Seung-A Jin, assistant professor of communication, this course is designed to teach students different quantitative and qualitative methods for researching mass media and their audiences. It explores how researchers have answered the following questions: How are people affected by mass media? What/who appears most frequently in the mass media? How do people make sense of the media messages they consume? Jin uses various modern technologies—including robots, video games, and haptics controllers—to provide students in this course with hands-on experience with new media and its use in research studies. 

In this video, Jin demonstrates some of the areas of research explored in her course, including human-robot interaction, health communication within the 3D virtual environment of Second Life, human interaction with virtual objects through haptics controllers, and the psychological and physiological effects of pro-social and violent video games.

About the professor

Seung-A "Annie" Jin joined the communication department in 2007 after earning her doctorate from the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Southern California. Her research interests include computer-mediated interpersonal communication (e.g., instant messaging and multiplayer online role-play gaming), computer/video games, and avatar-based advertising and marketing communication in the 3D virtual world of Second Life.
Read more | View Seung-A Jin's curriculum vitae 

In this short video, Prof. Jin introduces herself and discusses her background and research interests.