Sela Sar

headshot of Sela Sar
Professor of Advertising
233 Gregory Hall
Education
  • Ph.D., University of Minnesota (Mass Communication) 
  • M.A., University of Minnesota (Mass Communication)
Affiliations
  • Professor, Charles H. Sandage Department of Advertising
  • Institute of Communications Research 
  • Center for Social and Behavioral Science
Course Specialties

Sar has taught a variety of small and large-lecture courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels:

  • ADV281 Advertising Research Methods
  • ADV476 Global Advertising 
  • ADV483 Audience Analysis and Media Planning
  • ADV497 Colloquium in Advertising
  • ADV550 Foundations of Advertising
  • ADV581 Quantitative Research Methods in Advertising 
  • ADV588 Graduate Seminar II 
  • ADV590 Special Topics in Advertising
  • ADV597 Proseminar in Advertising
  • ADV598 MS Professional Project 
  • MDIA587 PhD Proseminar I
Background

Sar is an advertising professor. His teaching and research area concentrate on affect, advertising and consumer behavior. He is a senior associate editor of the International Journal of Advertising. He was Head of Advertising Division at AEJMC (2014-2015), President of American Academy of Advertising (2022-2023) and Director of Institute of Communications Research (2020-2023). He serves as a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Advertising, Journal of Current Issues and Research in Advertising and Journal of Interactive Advertising.

Research/Creative Endeavor

Sar’s research interest focuses on affect and advertising. He researches mood, emotions, perceptions, memory, judgment and decision making related to social/risk and health advertising. He also researches how people share emotional information and public health campaign messages online using affective computational approaches to study them. His research agenda contributes to the scholarship of advertising by providing a deeper understanding of the mechanisms and processes of how mood and emotions interact with various social advertising/risk and health messages to influence attitudes and behavior. His articles have appeared in the Journal of Advertising, International Journal of Advertising, Journal of Current Issues and Research in Advertising, Journal of Interactive Advertising, Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, Marketing & Psychology, Journal of Marketing Communications, Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, New Media and Society, and among others.