My name is Dr. Lucy Atkinson and I am an Associate Professor in the School of Advertising & PR in the Moody College of Communication at The University of Texas at Austin.

As a scholar of marketing communication, my research agenda focuses on the ways applied ethics are considered in the development, testing and distribution of strategic communication campaigns – from advertising and video games to social media and immersive virtual reality experiences – in the context of important, and often intersecting, social and moral issues like climate change, misinformation, social justice, and diversity and inclusion. It is firmly rooted in a normative concern for a well-functioning society and the ways in which marketing communication can serve as a means of both empowering and holding to account corporations and consumers with respect to their moral and ethical obligations.

I rely on a mix of quantitative and qualitative methods, including experiments, surveys, content analyses, focus groups and depth interviews. My research is grounded in questions about how marketing communication professionals and audiences conceptualize, understand and apply ethical frameworks in everyday practice. Current projects include: analyzing how marketing communications can balance the tensions between the oil and gas industry’s social license to operate and their ethical and moral responsibilities around sustainability; testing the risks and benefits of incorporating AI-assisted emergency weather messaging into city-wide marketing messages targeting underserved communities; exploring the ethical implications and responsibilities of marketing messages about sustainable consumption targeted at lower-income and minority consumers; investigating the potential for AI-created virtual humans to counter misinformation in social marketing climate change campaigns; and, testing morally framed social media campaigns to overcome medical mistrust and promote vaccine uptake among minority groups.

I have been PI or co-PI on grants totaling more than $8M from government and industry sources. These grants support research exploring stakeholder communication around sustainability and climate change issues. Current grants include $7M (as co-PI) from the NSF to explore environmental justice and resilience in underserved communities and $100K (as PI) from the City of Austin to examine multilingual AI-assisted emergency preparedness among underserved communities.

My work has appeared in top-ranked flagship journals, like the Journal of Advertising, Journal of Consumer Behavior, Journal of Current Issues & Research in Advertising, New Media & Society, Consumption Markets & Culture, International Journal of Consumer Studies, Risk Analysis and Public Relations Review. My research has been covered in international and national news media, including the Guardian (UK) newspaper, the CBC Radio show Ideas, and National Public Radio’s Weekend Edition and On Point with Tom Ashbrook.

In addition to my research, I have served as Associate Director of the UT-Austin Global Sustainability Leadership Institute, which trains students to be leaders around issues of environmental communication, responsible innovation, and corporate sustainability. I am also a senior fellow with the Texas Immersive Institute and a senior faculty research affiliate with the Center for Media Engagement, both in the Moody College of Communication.

I grew up in Toronto, Canada and earned my B.A. in Geography and Latin American-Caribbean Studies from McGill University. I earned my M.A. in Journalism from New York University and worked as a newspaper reporter and editor before pursuing my Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin – Madison.