Academic Profile : Faculty

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Assoc Prof Kim Hye Kyung
Associate Chair (Academic)
Associate Professor, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information
 
External Links
 
Dr. Hye Kyung (Kay) Kim is an Associate Professor in the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information (WKWSCI). Her overarching research goal is to apply communication and social psychological theories to understand the processing and effects of communicative interactions in health. She is particularly interested in the role of self-defense motives in health-decision making and the processing of personally relevant risk information in mediated contexts. Her research ultimately seeks to develop theory driven communication strategies that overcome resistance to health persuasion.

Her work has appeared in top-tier peer-reviewed academic journals such as Journal of Health Communication, Health Communication, Human Communication Research, Risk Analysis, and New Media & Society. She won various research awards, including Thesis Awards from the Institute for Public Relations and the International Communication Association (ICA). She is currently serving as an Associate Editor for the Journal of Health Communication.
Dr. Kim's research aims to design persuasive messages and innovative tools that could help improve individuals’ health decisions beyond their resistance. Much of her research has explored the interplay between (a) the individual factors that are relevant to resistance (e.g., optimistic bias, past unhealthy behaviors, and death anxiety) and (b) message (e.g., narratives, framing) and/or technological features (e.g., avatar, online self-monitoring) in shaping people’s judgment and beliefs on public health issues, as well as their personal health decisions. Guided by major theories in communication and social psychology, my research emphasizes on the explication of specific mechanisms that underlie individuals’ realization of their vulnerability to health risks that produce subsequent changes in health behaviors. She have mostly utilized quantitative research methods to investigate study predictions in a variety of health topics, including obesity, cancer prevention, the influenza pandemic, mental health issues, and food safety.

Major Research Areas:

• Risk and Health Communication
• Communication Theory
• Quantitative Research Methods
• Media Effects and Narrative Persuasion
 
  • Overcoming Spiritual Barriers to Cancer Screening: An Intervention to Decrease Cancer Fatalism among Singaporeans
  • SocioDigital Framework for Urban Resilience
Courses Taught
CS4150 Health Communication
CS4075 Selected Topics in PR: Evaluating & Producing Campaign Result
CS5005 The Power of the Media : Myth and Reality
A9108 Media Influence and Persuasion