UT Austin Professor Anita L. Vangelisti Wins Distinguished Scholar Award from the National Communication Association

AUSTIN, Texas – Aug. 28, 2014 – Anita L. Vangelisti, professor in the Department of Communication Studies at The University of Texas at Austin Moody College of Communication, is one of the 2014 recipients of the Distinguished Scholar Award from the National Communication Association.

"The Communication discipline has a long tradition of exceptional scholarship," said Nancy Kidd, NCA's Executive Director. "We're proud to recognize Dr. Vangelisti's contributions with this well-deserved award."

Given annually, the award recognizes and rewards NCA members for a lifetime of scholarly achievement in the study of human communication. Recipients are selected to showcase the communication profession. The award is supported by the Mark L. Knapp Distinguished Scholar Fund. Since 1992, those recognized as NCA Distinguished Scholars nominate and elect members to join this select group.

Vangelisti's research focuses on interpersonal communication among family members and between romantic partners. Her current work focuses on how communication affects, and is affected by, emotions and interpretive processes.

Her research has appeared in journals such as Communication Monographs, Human Communication Research, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Personal Relationships, Family Relations, Journal of Adolescent Research and Journal of Social and Personal Relationships. She has also served as president of the International Association for Relationship Research.

"Anita Vangelisti is a first-rate scholar whose work in communication among family members, intimates, and friends is cutting edge in the study of interpersonal communication," said Barry Brummett, professor and chair of the Department of Communication Studies. "The NCA Distinguished Scholar Award is a career capping honor given to very few, and certainly well-deserved in this case."

In addition to receiving NCA's Distinguished Scholar Award, she is a past recipient of NCA's Bernard J. Brommel Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Family Communication, NCA's Franklin H. Knower Article Award and the International Society for the Study of Personal Relationships’ New Contribution Award.

Past Distinguished Scholar Award recipients from Moody College include Professor John Daly, former Dean and Professor Ellen Wartella, Dean Roderick P. HartProfessor Emeritus Mark Knapp and former Professor Kathleen Hall Jamieson.

For more information about NCA's awards program, visit http://www.natcom.org/awards/.

About the National Communication Association

The National Communication Association (NCA) advances Communication as the discipline that studies all forms, modes, media, and consequences of communication through humanistic, social scientific, and aesthetic inquiry. NCA serves the scholars, teachers, and practitioners who are its members by enabling and supporting their professional interests in research and teaching. Dedicated to fostering and promoting free and ethical communication, NCA promotes the widespread appreciation of the importance of communication in public and private life, the application of competent communication to improve the quality of human life and relationships, and the use of knowledge about communication to solve human problems.

For more information, visit natcom.org, follow us on Twitter at @natcomm, and find us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/NationalCommunicationAssociation.

About The University of Texas at Austin Moody College of Communication


One of the nation's foremost institutions for the study of advertising and public relations, communication sciences and disorders, communication studies, journalism and radio-TV-film, The University of Texas at Austin Moody College of Communication is preparing students to thrive in an era of media convergence. Serving more than 4,700 undergraduate and graduate students, the Moody College is nationally recognized for its faculty members, research and student media. For more information about the Moody College, visit http://moody.utexas.edu.

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Contacts: Laura Byerley, (512) 471-2182.

Laura Byerley
Public Affairs Representative