S. Shyam Sundar Pennsylvania State University, USA
S. Shyam Sundar (PhD, Stanford University) is James P. Jimirro Professor of Media Effects and founding director of the Media Effects Research Laboratory at Penn State University’s College of Communications. Prof. Sundar studies social and psychological effects of communication technology. His experiments investigate human-computer interaction (HCI) and computer-mediated communication (CMC) with a specific focus on technological elements such as multi-modality and interactivity that are unique to modern digital media. His research portfolio also includes new theoretical propositions and methodological suggestions based on rigorous explications of concepts and sustained efforts to empirically study them. His research is supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF), Korea Science and Engineering Foundation, MacArthur Foundation, and Facebook, Inc., among others.
A frequently cited source on technology, Sundar has testified before the U.S. Congress as an expert witness and delivered talks at universities in several countries. He is editor of the first-ever Handbook of the Psychology of Communication Technology, published by Blackwell Wiley in 2015. He has served as editor-in-chief of the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication and on the editorial boards of 20 other journals. He is a Fellow of the International Communication Association (ICA), and has served as chair of its Communication & Technology division, 2008-2010. He is a recipient of the Frederick Williams Prize awarded by the division for contribution to the study of communication technology. He is also winner of the Paul J. Deutschmann award for excellence in research from the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC).
