With the emergence of various forms of Internet-based communication, the blurred boundary between mass and interpersonal communication has been frequently noted, but tends to remain as rhetoric. In a series of studies, I have borrowed theoretical constructs and models from the mass communication literature and tested their applicability beyond traditional boundaries. In South Korea, user-generated comments on news websites, a signature form of interpersonal interactivity, have been blamed for distorting public opinion and fostering prejudice and stereotypes against particular social groups. My research has examined when and how user comments affect the way people process and make sense of the news and perceive reality. Results often challenged long-held assumptions of existing theories, helped elucidate the underlying mechanisms, and/or extended their boundaries.

Eun-Ju Lee (Ph. D. Stanford University) is Professor in the Department of Communication at Seoul National University, Republic of Korea. Her research centers on social cognition and social influence in computer-based communication. She has investigated how the mediation by technology affects the ways in which people form impressions about their interactants, process information, and respond to group dynamics. Her more recent projects are concerned with how user comments on Internet news sites shape individuals’ perceptions of and reactions to news and how social media are utilized as a channel for para-social interaction with politicians. She has published over 50 journal articles and book chapters and her work has won several top paper awards from various divisions of International Communication Association (ICA), National Communication Association (NCA), and Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC). She was a Board Member-at-Large for ICA (2009-2012), representing East Asia, and has served as Associate Editor for the Journal of Communication and Human Communication Research. She also co-edited Media Psychology and is incoming Editor-in-Chief of Human Communication Research.