Juwon Hwang

Juwon Hwang is an assistant professor of media science in the College of Communication at Boston University. Her program of research is at the intersections of health communication and new media technologies, where she investigates mechanisms through which individuals engage in behavioral changes that can lead to beneficial health outcomes. She also designs evidence-based health campaign messages to promote compliance with preventive measures such as vaccination. Hwang combines conventional and computational approaches, to study how new media technology takes shape of mental well-being, and how political polarization plays a role in shaping individual views over scientific and health issues. Her recent work explores the potential of Virtual Reality as a tool to mitigate mental distress.

Hwang’s research has been funded by the National Science Foundation and Vaccine Confidence Fund. She has written over 20 articles in leading communication and health informatics journals such as Journal of Health Communication, Health Communication, New Media and Society, Journal of Medical Internet Research, Plos One, and Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking. She is also a recipient of Top Paper Award from the Association for Education in Journalism & Mass Communication.