Lars Willnat
Associate Professor of Media and Public Affairs
Associate Professor of International Affairs
Director of Graduate Studies

**Please direct all graduate program inquiries to smpa2@gwu.edu**

Phone: (202) 994-8467
Fax: (202) 994-5806
E-mail: lwillnat@gwu.edu
Office: MPA 424

Expertise

Public Opinion, Political Communication, International Communication

Courses Taught

SMPA 51, Research Methods
SMPA 150, International Communication
SMPA 202, Media Theory and Effects
SMPA 241, Quantitative Media Research Methods
PCM 100, Introduction to Political Communication
EMDA 185, Comparative Communication Systems

Selected Works

Lars Willnat, Zhou He, Toshio Takashi, and Esteban Lopez-Escobar (2002). "Perceptions of Foreign Media Influence in Asia and Europe: The Third Person Effect and Media Imperialism." The International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 14, 175-192.

Lars Willnat (2000). "Agenda-Setting and Priming: Conceptual Links and Differences," Donald Shaw, Maxwell McCombs, and David H. Weaver (eds.) Communication and Democracy, London: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, pp. 51-66.

Lars Willnat and David Weaver (1998). "Public Opinion on Investigative Reporting in the 1990's: Has Anything Changed Since the 1980's?" Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 75, 449-463.

Lars Willnat (1996). "Mass Media and Political Outspokenness in Hong Kong: Testing the Interaction of the Third-Person Effect and the Spiral of Silence." The International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 8, 187-212.

Background

Lars Willnat is Associate Professor in the School of Media and Public Affairs and the Elliott School of International Affairs. After receiving his Ph.D. from Indiana University in 1992, he taught at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and joined GWU in 1996.

He currently serves as Director of the GW Center for Survey Research, conducting local and national public opinion polls on social and political issues.

His current work focuses on an international study of media effects on attitudes toward the war in Iraq and U.S. foreign policy.

Willnat's work on political and international communication has appeared in a variety of communication journals and books.

Education

Ph.D., Mass Communication, Indiana University, 1992

M.A., Mass Communication, Indiana University, 1991

B.A., Journalism, Political Science, Philosophy, Free University of Berlin, Germany, 1988