R. Lance Holbert, Ph.D.

Lance Holbert’s research focuses on how a range of communication activities impact people’s understanding of American democratic processes and outcomes.

Lance Holbert completed his B.A. degree in History at the University of Rochester and then moved directly into securing dual graduate degrees from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications and Maxwell School of Citizenship.  He went to work in politics for several years before returning to his studies to earn a doctoral degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  Lance has held professorial positions at the University of Missouri, the University of Delaware, The Ohio State University, the University of South Carolina, and Temple University.  His most recent administrative experience within these positions includes serving as Department Chair for multiple units at Temple University.

Holbert is a quantitative social scientist whose scholarship focuses on media, politics, and persuasion.  He has published works focusing on the effects of news, debates, social media, political satire, political conventions, political advertising, deliberative processes, and fact checking.  The outcomes he has looked at span the hierarchy of effects from awareness and knowledge to attitudes and behaviors.  Most recently, he has authored a series of works that address a range of meta-theoretical issues within the field of Communication. He has served as Chair of the Mass Communication Divisions of the National Communication Association and International Communication Association, as well as the National Communication Association’s Political Communication Division.  In 2023, Dr. Holbert completed a four-year stint as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Communication.

Holbert had (co-)authored over 120 peer-reviewed articles, books, and book chapters and these works have generated 10,000+ Google citations. He has served as an Annenberg Public Policy Center Distinguished Research Fellow for the past decade and was named a Fellow of the International Communication Association in 2020.  Some of his more coveted honors include being named the National Communication Association’s Mass Communication Teacher of the Year (2012), receiving the International Communication Association’s association-wide Top Article Award (2022), and the University of Wisconsin’s Harold L. Nelson Award for Distinguished Alumni.  He currently serves on the editorial boards of nine peer-review journals.