Alicia Mason

About Dr. Alicia Mason Collins

Dr. Alicia Mason joined the PSU Department of Communication in Fall of 2009. She is a former broadcaster, who worked with local media outlets KOAM and KKOW in SE Kansas, prior to earning a Ph.D. from the University of Oklahoma. Dr. Mason's work has been presented at several national and international conferences and appears in top academic journals including Communication Quarterly, Communication Monographs, Health Education Journal, Health Communication, International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, International Journal of Business Communication, Journal of Emergency Management and Disaster Communications, and Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Insights. 

Mason’s academic interests in health, risk, and crisis communication spans corporate, public health, and environmental contexts. Her research explores public responses to crises, outbreaks, and disasters, applied organizational communication practices of advocacy, corporate social responsibility, and accessibility, and addresses matters of consumer protection, patient safety, and health policy in relation to domestic and international medical tourism. 

Mason frequently collaborates with undergraduate and graduate students as the director of the Communication Research Lab at Pittsburg State University. She offers coursework in the Strategic Communication undergraduate emphasis area and advanced coursework in Corporate Communication, Health Communication, Risk and Crisis Communication, and Conspiracy Theories and Deception. 

Dr. Mason was the 2013 recipient of the Pittsburg State Outstanding Undergraduate Research Mentor Award, and the 2014 recipient of the Outstanding Teaching Award and 2021 Outstanding Research Award in the College of Arts and Sciences. Mason currently serves as a Professor in the department of Communication and the director of Graduate Studies in Communication.

Education

• PhD., Communication, University of Oklahoma, Oklahoma, U.S.A., 2010
• M.A. Communication, Pittsburg State University, Kansas, U.S.A., 2006
• B.S., Communication/Journalism Emphasis, Pittsburg State University, Kansas, U.S.A., 2005

Teaching Emphases

• Health Communication
• Risk and Crisis Communication
• Corporate Communication

Peer-reviewed Journal Article(s)

• Mason, A.M. & Wright, K. (2011). Framing medical tourism: An examination of appeal, risk, convalescence, accreditation, and interactivity in medical tourism websites. Journal of Health Communication, 16(2), 163-77. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M., & Wright, K., Bogard, J. (2011). Assessing cultural representations of physician and patient imagery in medical tourism websites. Journal of Intercultural Communication, 25.

• Mason. A.M., & Miller, C. H. (2013). Inoculation message treatments offer insights for curbing non-communicable disease development. Pan American Journal of Public Health. 34(1), 29–35. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M. (2014). The impact of media frames and treatment responsibility within the situational crisis communication theory framework. Corporate Reputation Review. 17, 78-90.

• Mason, A.M. (2014). Overcoming the dual-delivery stigma: A review of patient-centeredness within the Costa Rican medical tourism industry. International Journal of Communication and Health, 4, 1-9. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M. & Miller, C.H. (2015). The ability of inoculation to confer resistance to deceptive health-nutrition related advertising claims. Health Education Journal, 75(2), 144-157. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M. (2016). Media frames and crisis events: Understanding the impact on corporate reputations, responsibility attributions, and negative affect. International Journal of Business Communication. doi:10.1177/2329488416648951 (LINK)

• Mason, A.M., Drew, S. & Weaver. D. (2017).  Managing crisis-induced uncertainty: First responder experiences from the 2011 Joplin-Duquesne tornado. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction. 23, 231-237.  (LINK)

• Hooey, C., Mason, A.M. & Triplett, J. (2017). Beyond greening: The challenges to adopting sustainability in higher education. The Midwest Quarterly, Spring, 3. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M., Hooey, C., Triplett, J., & Pogue, J. (2017). Deflection, disassociation, and acknowledgement: A content analysis of the 2011-2014 media framing of hydraulic fracturing and Oklahoma earthquakes. Journal of Science Communication 16(4), 1-21. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M., Flores, L., Lui, P., Tims, M., Gire, G., & Spencer, E. (2019). Disaster communication: An analysis of the digital communication efforts used by the medical tourism industry in the 2017 Caribbean hurricane season. Journal of Tourism & Hospitality: Special Edition Ensuring quality healthcare outcomes in medical tourism. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M. (2019). Sulitest^®: A mixed-method, pilot study of assessment impacts on undergraduate sustainability-related learning and motivation. Journal of Sustainability Education (May 2019). (LINK)

• Mason, A. M., Wright, K., Lambert, L. (2021). Understanding the impacts of emerging infectious disease (EID) media exposure: The 2014 case of U.S. Ebola virus disease (EVD). Journal of Communication in Healthcare: Strategies, Media and Engagement in Global Health. Taylor & Francis Publishers (LINK)

• Mason, A., Spencer, E., Barnett, K. & Bouchie, J. (2021). Examining the prominence and congruence of organizational corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication in medical tourism provider websites.  Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Insights  (LINK)

• Compton, J. & Mason, A.M. (2021). Immunization communication in “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood”: inoculation theory, health messaging, and children’s entertainment television. The Midwest Quarterly. (LINK) (LINK)

• Mason, A. M., Compton, J., & Bhati, S. (2021). Disabilities and the digital divide: Assessing web accessibility, readability, and mobility of popular health websites. Journal of Health Communication, 10(36), pgs 667-674. (LINK)

• Mason, A. M., Compton, J., & Bhati, S. (2022). Identifying accessibility improvement opportunities for global environmental communication websites. Western Journal of Communication. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M., Compton, J. & Spencer, E.A. (2023). Understanding Individual Differences in the Dimensions of ‘Vestedness’ within Midwestern Populations toward the Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) during Early-Stage Pandemic Onset. The Midwest Quarterly, 64(3), 242-230.

• Mason, A.M. & Bhati, S. (2023). Ready.gov: Who’s ready, really?  Examining principles of inclusivity and universal design in emergency management and disaster preparedness public information websites. Journal of Emergency Management and Disaster Communications (LINK) (LINK)

• Mason, A.M., Spencer, E.A., Westhoff, M.C., Livingston, K.M., & Compton, J. (2023). Surveilling the web, mobile, and language accessibility of Communication’s digital presence within institutions of higher education globally. Journal of Communication Pedagogy (LINK)

• Mason, A.M., Compton, J., Tice, E., Peterson, B., Lewis, I., Glenn, T., Combs, T (2022). Analyzing the Prophylactic and Therapeutic Role of Inoculation to Facilitate Resistance to Conspiracy Theory Beliefs Communication Reports (forthcoming Fall 2023)

• Mason, A.M., Compton, J., Spencer, E.A., & Barnett, K. (2023). Outbreak Communication: Exploring the Relationships between Health Information Seeking Behaviors, Vested Interests, and COVID-19 Knowledge in U.S. Midwest Populations. The Midwest Quarterly (forthcoming Fall 2023).

• Mason, A.M. (2023). Medical Tourism & Communication. Oxford Research Encyclopedia. Oxford University Press. (forthcoming Fall 2023).

Book Chapter(s)

• Wright, K. & Mason, A. (2013). Medical tourism: The role of communication regarding risks and benefits of obtaining medical services abroad. In (Eds) M. H. Eaves Applications in Health Communication. Kendall Hunt Publishing. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M. & Triplett, J. (2015). Controlling environmental crisis messages in uncontrollable media environments: The 2011 case of Blue-green Algae on Grand Lake O’ the Cherokees, OK. In (Eds) Communicating Climate Change and Natural Hazard Risk and Cultivating Resilience. Springer Publishing. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M. & Spencer, E. (2016). Health communication: Insights for quality H2H delivery in medical tourism. In Eds (DeMicco) Medical Tourism: Hospitality Bridging Healthcare (H2H) and Wellness. Apple Academic Press.

• Compton, J. & Mason, A.M. (2020). Narrative and the inoculation theory of resistance to influence. Book chapter accepted in Innovations and Implications of Persuasive Narrative. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M., Bhati, S., Jiang, R., Spencer, E. (2022). Medical tourism patient mortality: Considerations from a 10-Year review of global news media representations. Book chapter re-printed. Research Anthology on Improving Health Literacy Through Patient Communication and Mass Media. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M., Spencer, E.A., Macek, K., Smith, A. & Potter, S. (2023). Examining the Influence of Proxy Communicators about Organizational Crises in Response to Digital News Reports. Book Chapter: Reprinted in Eds M. Ciurea Current Topics on Business, Economics and Finance. (LINK)

• Mason, A.M., Spencer, E.A., Combs, T., Glenn, T., Lewis, I., Peterson, B. L., & Tice, E. (2023). Fandom & Activism: Experimenting with memetic communication appeals about human rights issues during the 2022 Winter Olympic games. Book Chapter: Abeza, G. & Sanderson, J. (Eds.). (in press, 2023). Social Media in Sport: Evidence Based Insights. Routledge. London, UK.