Stephenson Beck, assistant professor of communication, has co-written two new publications.

“Perceiving strategic meeting interaction” was published in Small Group Research.
 The study investigates how individuals perceive the message strategies of team members, and how these perceptions relate to meeting interaction. The article was co-written with J. Keyton of North Carolina State University. Beck also has been asked to serve on the journal’s editorial board.


”Macrocognition: A communicative perspective” was published in Theoretical Issues in Ergonomic Science.
 The publication discussed how interaction and shared meaning are complicated from a communication perspective. It necessitates a different way of understanding macrocognition, which describes cognitive functions in natural decision-making settings, in addition to a different way of capturing the concept methodologically. The article was co-written with Keyton and M.B. Asbury from the University of Kansas.

“Oftentimes, we take communication for granted,” Beck said. “We assume that a group member’s message is understood the same way by other members. Examining interpretive differences helps us better understand dysfunction in social interaction.”

Beck joined the NDSU faculty in 2008 after completing his doctorate at the University of Kansas. He earned his bachelor’s degree at Brigham Young University and his master’s degree at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.