Research

Research in the College of Communication and Information Sciences

Research in the College of Communication and Information Sciences takes many forms and covers a wide range of topics. Our faculty engage in scholarship through surveys, focus groups, interviews, observations, rhetorical study, documentary production, investigative journalism and much more. Research is celebrated in C&IS by recognizing the excellence of our faculty and students, and through workshops, colloquia, and the annual Diversity Symposium.

The Institute for Communication and Information Research

The Institute for Communication and Information Research (ICIR) specializes in creative and effective research designs, participant recruitment, and insightful reporting.  The institute provides effective research solutions, facilities and support to faculty and industry professionals. Here, you will find some of the resources and opportunities supported by the ICIR.


The College of Communication and Information Sciences’ faculty and students at The University of Alabama conduct cutting-edge research that creates knowledge and provides solutions to global issues across the full communication and information spectrum.


Signature Research Areas

While faculty and students in the College of Communication and Information Sciences conduct research in many areas, we highlight three signature areas of research:

Emergent Media

No program encompassing issues of media can fully explore the rapidly shifting landscape without focusing on digital platforms and their impact within social, user-generated, mobile and other newer terrains. Keenly focused on such issues, faculty and students in C&IS are utilizing big data, research laboratories and local partnerships to advance understandings of emergent media and the effects of these changes in production, consumption and public reasoning. 

Health Communication

Health communication research is one of the fastest-growing areas of investigation in communication. The college has a variety of research facilities within the Institute for Communication and Information Research including a child media lab, content analysis lab and psychophysiology lab. Recent projects focus on health disparities across states, mental health stigma and representations in a mediated context, and health literacy in children.

Sports Communication

The University of Alabama produces more research in the area of sports communication than any known American institution. Students are highly engaged in seminars and collaborative research projects focusing on the role of sports within all forms of the communication discipline. Projects focus on issues such as how sports relate to journalism, gender, race, public relations campaigns, rhetorical movements, social media, archiving, sponsorship, broadcasting trends and social change.


April 12, 2021

Research Spotlight: Dr. A.J. Bauer

United States history is home to a diverse and ever-shifting spectrum of political ideas. As political parties rise and fall, and power narrowly swings from one majority opinion to the […]

March 16, 2021

‘Revise and Resubmit’ Podcast Talks C&IS Research

It used to be that faculty members in the College of Communication and Information Sciences (C&IS) could routinely walk to their departmental mailboxes and find a printed bulletin, titled the […]
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