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Courses

Communication Studies (COMM)
Master of Arts in Applied Communication
  • COMM-C 500 Advanced Communication Theory (3 cr.) Students explore how scholars from various traditions have described and explained the universal human experience of communication. Students develop an understanding of a variety of communication theories to more completely interpret events in more flexible, useful, and discriminating ways.
  • COMM-C 501 Applied Quantitative Research Methods in Communication (3 cr.) The course is designed to offer an opportunity to examine, assess, and conduct quantitative research that employs communication theory and qualitative research methods as a means to test theory in applied settings and/or as a means to applied ends (i.e. problem-solving policy analysis).
  • COMM-C 502 Applied Qualitative Research Methods in Communication (3 cr.) P: 6 credits (at any level) of coursework in Communication Studies. Inductive (data-to-theory) approach to knowledge, and associated sequential and non-sequential methods for studying communication in applied everyday situations; e.g., friendships and other close personal dyads, families, small groups, organizations, and public, media, historical, computer mediated, or health-related contexts.
  • COMM-C 503 Applied Learning Project (3 cr.) An applied learning project that provides students with a culminating educational experience. The project gives students the opportunity to apply their knowledge of communicative processes to real-life organizational problems, and provides the opportunity to produce a body of work reflecting their abilities.
  • COMM-C 504 Professional Seminar in Communication Graduate Studies (3 cr.) The course provides an orientation to graduate school expectations and a stronger grasp of the diverse approaches (methods) to constructing knowledge via Communication Studies Research. Students will be expected to perform at graduate level standards in writing for an academic audience, thinking and arguing critically, and analyzing/synthesizing published research.
  • COMM-C 505 Proseminar in Communication Studies Pedagogy (1 cr.) This course is designed to provide students with a survey of the concepts and strategies for effective pedagogy in communication.  Emphasis is placed on building skills and confidence in designing lessons, using appropriate instructional and assessment strategies, and developing a unique and coherent teaching philosophy.
  • COMM-C 510 Health Provider-Consumer Communication (3 cr.) Designed to teach communication skills and practices related to health care talk by examining transactional communication within health care contexts. Topics covered in this course focus directly upon interpersonal dialogue between health care providers and patients.
  • COMM-C 520 Advanced Public Communication (3 cr.) Critical analysis and employment of rhetorical strategies in forms and types of professional discourses incorporating current technologies.
  • COMM-C 521 Family Communication in Health Contexts (3 cr.) This interdisciplinary seminar focuses on communication involving families in health care settings, addressing significant issues for graduate and professional students who will work with families, including students in Comm. Studies, Nursing, Psychology, Social Work, Public Health, and Medicine. Topics include communication with families about health care concerns and family-patient-health provider systems.
  • COMM-C 526 Effective Media Strategies (3 cr.) This course specifically focuses on the effective use of media as a means of persuasion. This course explains how ideas are expressed through techniques unique to the language of radio, television, film, and the Internet.
  • COMM-C 528 Group Communication and Organizations (3 cr.) This seminar-format course examines the ways in which informal groups and communication networks facilitate a variety of organizational processes (i.e., socialization, diffusion of innovation). Emphasis is placed on developing theoretical understanding of informal groups in organizations as well as on methodological issues involved in studying communication networks in organizations.
  • COMM-C 530 Communication Criticism (3 cr.) This course will introduce students to criticism as a method of studying persuasive messages in speeches, fiction, mass media, musical lyrics, political campaign literature, art, and other modes of communication in contemporary culture.
  • COMM-C 531 Media Theory and Criticism (3 cr.) A course organized primarily around theories and critical strategies commonly considered within the broad category of contemporary criticism. The course utilizes primary theoretical texts to introduce students to a variety of methodologies employed in analyzing media messages, and emphasizes the application of theoretical frameworks on the analysis of specific media texts.
  • COMM-C 533 Improvisation for Scientist (1 cr.) Students will learn to communicate effectively and responsively through a series of exercises drawn from the methods of improvisational theater. Students will practice connecting to an audience, paying dynamic attention to others, reading nonverbal cues, and responding appropriately.
  • COMM-C 534 Distilling Your Message (1 cr.) Students learn to communicate clearly and vividly about complex scientific research and why it matters, in terms non-scientists can understand. Students practice finding common ground with lay audiences and adjusting levels of message complexity for different audiences.
  • COMM-C 535 Using Electronic Media (1 cr.) Given the significant gaps in understanding between the public and scientists, this course trains students in the sciences and health professions to format and structure formatted and structured complex, scientific information for a variety of new, electronic communication platforms including social media. Students will collate, synthesize, and translate scientific evidence into information that a non-expert audience can access, understand, and act on.
  • COMM-C 536 Connecting with the Community (1 cr.) Students will theorize and develop techniques for shared meaning-making with community partners. They test methods to develop common ground between experts and community members including the lay public and policy makers. Activities focus on developing trust, open communication, and sharing expertise that values and respects lived experiences of community members.
  • COMM-C 544 Advanced Relational Communication (3 cr.) Applications of communication theory/ research in such areas as relational culture and relationship development. Includes a scholarly project on a real relationship, and applications of research to areas such as pedagogy and couple/family therapy.
  • COMM-C 580 Advanced Organizational Communication (3 cr.) The course provides a solid foundation of concepts for understanding and discussing human organizations. Students will analyze, evaluate, and apply the theories and practices related to organizational issues. Through case studies, readings, and practical applications, this course combines a theory-based understanding of communication in organizations with real-world applications.
  • COMM-C 582 Advanced Intercultural Communication (3 cr.) Exploration of issues related to the intercultural communication process. Consideration of the role of social, cultural, and historical contexts in intercultural interactions. Examination of the relationship between culture and communication from the socio-psychological, interpretive, and critical perspectives.
  • COMM-C 591 Topics/Seminar in Applied Communication (3 cr.) This is a revolving topics course. The changing nature of the topic allows graduate students to explore, synthesize, and integrate knowledge of the field of communication and the particular discipline of applied communication while focusing on a single topic not otherwise addressed in the course of study. May be repeated for credit.
  • COMM-C 592 Advanced Health Communication (3 cr.) A course designed to teach communication skills and practices related to health care by examining health care communication theory. Topics range across communication levels (interpersonal, intrapersonal, group, organization, mass media, and mediated communication) within a variety of health care contexts.
  • COMM-C 593 Advanced Family Communication (3 cr.) Applications of theory and research on the role of communication in creating and maintaining marriages/committed couples and families. Includes a scholarly term paper on a real couple or family's communication.
  • COMM-C 594 Communication and Conflict Management in Organizations (3 cr.) This seminar-format course examines the communication exchanges that facilitate conflict management within organizational contexts. Specific attention is focused on negotiation and mediation; however, the communication of alternative means of conflict and dispute resolution are also discussed. In addition, students will be introduced to methods for assessing conflict interaction in organizations.
  • COMM-C 597 Thesis (3 cr.) Applied communication students who choose the thesis option will identify a research topic and develop it under the guidance of the student's thesis director (IUPUI professor). The thesis topic will be related to the field of applied communication in its foci and method.
  • COMM-C 598 Internship (1-3 cr.) This course integrates applied communication theory and practice in a practice setting. Students will apply theoretical concepts and research tools, conduct projects, and interact with communication professionals in the designated setting. In concert with the student's chosen area of concentration, he or she will address issues of importance to that particular organization.
  • COMM-C 599 Independent Study (1-6 cr.) This course provides students with the opportunity to synthesize and apply knowledge acquired through course work and professional experience into a completed research project in applied communication. Students will work independently on a topic/issue of choice under the guidance of graduate faculty.
  • COMM-C 620 Computer-Mediated Communication (3 cr.) An overview of practical and scholarly approaches to computer mediated communication. The readings address mass communication, discourse, community, gender, intercultural understanding, ethics, interpersonal relationships, identity, organizational communication, and education.
  • COMM-C 621 Persuasion (3 cr.) Takes a rhetorical/critical approach to persuasion in its broadest sense, how it affects our lives everyday and how we can find evidence of persuasive tactics in unexpected places. We will look broadly at theories of persuasion and their application across contexts and fields.
  • COMM-C 644 Political Communication (3 cr.) Examines the public communication involved in various political contexts. We will consider the communication involved in political campaigns, advertising, and oratory; social media, technology, and popular culture; the news, framing, and political media; citizenship, public deliberation, and decision making in what some argue is a divided political culture. We will read and discuss state of the art research in political communication and meet individuals who are currently working in a communication capacity in public political campaigns.
  • COMM-C 650 Health Communication in Mediated Contexts (3 cr.) Focus on the effect of media on health behavior. Theories of health behavior change and media effects examined; applications of theory to health campaigns evaluated. Examples of mediated health campaigns and effectiveness discussed. Considerations include: interplay among theory, research, practice; how theory informs practice; how research aids in theory construction/refinement.
  • COMM-C 680 Qualitative Research Methods (3 cr.) An introduction to qualitative research methods in communication studies, with an emphasis on health communication research. Provides an overview of several techniques for gathering and analyzing qualitative data.
  • COMM-C 690 Doctoral Quantitative Methods (3 cr.) Course focuses on the principles and theory of descriptive and inferential statistics within the context of health communication research. Topics include ttest, ANOVA, MANOVA, ANCOVA, correlation, multiple regression, and SEM. Students will gain proficiency using SPSS to analyze novel data sets, and will conduct their own health communication research projects and report the results.
  • COMM-C 695 Seminar in Communication and Healthcare (3 cr.) This seminar offers an interface between learning from practicing providers and experts in medical care specialties and becoming enmeshed in health communication research. The course is structured so that the student gains insights from experts in the medical field while also gaining an overview of research issues through reading and engaging in health communication research.
  • COMM-C 700 Fieldwork/Research (1 - 9 cr.) This course is designed to allow PhD students to complete independent research projects prior to enrollment in the dissertation course. Students can enroll in 1-9 credit hours in any given semester, depending on the nature of the project. The fieldwork/research course is designed to focus the student's research interests and to serve as a spring-board for dissertation work. Students must have ample preparation in some theoretical area and in one or more research methods prior to registration for the course. The course will allow students to initiate or conduct a research study, including the collection and examination of data (broadly defined), to answer a question or to test a hypothesis related to communication theory. May be repeated for credit.
  • COMM-C 810 Dissertation (1 - 12 cr.) This course is eligible for a deferred grade.