Important Questions for Communication Scholars

These are questions that guide my research and I believe they are important for all researchers and communication scholars. Feel free to add questions in the comments and debate the value of these questions. Within my interests in politics, policy formation, and the negotiation of power, I try to consider:

General Research Questions

What is my object or artifact of inquiry?
Is this artifact "interesting" or valuable to the academic community?

What questions operationalize and analyze my artifact?

How do I answer these questions?

Whose shoulders can I stand on?

Topic Specific Questions

Why do people believe some things over others?

What influences information consumption?

How are people accessing and processing information and data?

What are the effects of technology on social, political, and cultural activities?

Who has power, how did they obtain it, and how do they use it?

Who are the privileged/marginalized voices and what do they say?

What elements of speeches, advertisements, images, and narratives make them persuasive?

What arguments are believed and why?