Argues that business communication is not improving, despite a deluge of advice. Suggests that change is made more difficult by hard to remember rules and directives that are couched in technical jargon. Offers an alternative heuristic focusing on context. (JAD)

Addresses five questions that must be considered by business communication researchers if the results of surveys are to be significant and useful: What do the researches want to know? About whom do they want to know it? How should the questions be worded? How should appropriate and adequate responses be elicited? and How are the results to be…

Explains that Type I error is a risk undertaken whenever significance tests are conducted, and the chances of committing a Type I error increase as the number of significance tests increases. Notes that adjusting the alpha level because of the number of tests conducted in a given study has no principled basis, commits one to absurd beliefs and…

Identifies and discusses the effects of single sourcing on the writing process. Provides suggestions for incorporating the teaching of single sourcing into technical communication courses. Concludes that educating students about the process of single sourcing is important if they are to become effective technical communicators in the industry. (SG)

Suggests business communication faculty will benefit from an understanding of three areas related to Institutional Review Board (IRB) review of class projects involving human subjects research: (1) whether their institution requires such class projects to be reviewed by the IRB; (2) how they can adapt classroom activities, materials, and…

Deals with the problematics that globalization poses for critical communication scholarship. Address how uneven patterns of global processes are enacted through cultural practices produced by the transnational flows of images and capital. Explores several areas of contemporary global growth with the overall objective of demonstrating the urgency…

Explores the potential of complexity theory as a unifying theory in public relations, where scholars have recently raised problems involving flux, uncertainty, adaptiveness, and loss of control. Describes specific complexity-based methodologies and their potential for public relations studies. Offers an account of complexity theory, its…

Discusses not only the procedures, assumptions, and applications of advanced categorical statistics, but also covers some common misapplications, from which a great deal can be learned. Addresses the use and limitations of cross-tabulation and chi-square analysis, as well as issues such as observation independence and artificial inflation of a…

Designed to assist social scientists interested in conducting mass communication research, this report describes a number of sources of mass communication data and information. The sources are grouped in two categories: print media (primarily newspapers and magazines) and electronic media (radio, television, and motion pictures). These categories…

Advocates a strong role for research in graduate study in communication, a variety of research approaches, and particularly, more sophistication in data gathering, measurement, and analysis. (PD)

Links the notion of "centering communication" to a recent conference theme, "Translating Our Scholarship Into Practice." Begins with some cursory observations about how the theory-practice relationship tends to play out in the organizational communication field. Poses some questions that might steer educators to revise it. (SG)

Shows that assessment is not "service," but scholarship. Discusses assessment as a legitimate form of research that meets both the definition and spirit of the term. Concludes that assessment involves a great deal of invention, creativity, development, rigor, and reflection, which moves the activity into the realm of creative and scholarly…

Advances practices for designing, analyzing, and reporting communication research. Focuses on improving researchers' abilities to cumulate results across studies and improving the utility of the individual study. Concludes by summarizing the set of propositions advocated. (SG)

Suggests that organizational communication educators should become more conscientious about applying scholarship within academic communities--in the home departments as well as other units within institutions. Argues that educators should become more proactive about helping students to apply what they are learning in the courses. (SG)

Introduces a tool for rethinking the sources of the distinctions between "us" and "them." Considers two approaches to extending the reach of organizational communication research based on this framework. Hopes to move organizational communication concepts into more influential positions in the existing network of practice, and that doing so will…