Junghyun Moon

Biography

Junghyun Moon is a Ph.D. candidate (ABD) in The Media School, having earned his M.A. in journalism and mass communication from Sungkyunkwan University in Seoul, South Korea, in 2015. After receiving his M.A. degree, he worked as a researcher in the National Credit Union Federation of Korea (NACUFOK) for three years, where he worked with researchers from a variety of disciplines (e.g., business, economics, and law).

His research primarily focuses on deepening an understanding of public perceptions of media. In particular, his current work investigates how public perceptions of media effects and the trustworthiness of media influence citizens’ engagement with media. Experienced in both quantitative and qualitative research methods, his past work has examined topics such as news media use, perceptions of media (and polling) effects, media trust, and news media importance. His research has been published in a variety of respected outlets, including the International Journal of Public Opinion Research, Mass Communication and Society, Newspaper Research Journal, and the Korean Journal of Journalism & Communication Studies; he is the lead author in the majority of these publications

Dissertation Project

Perceptions of public opinion polls and their influence on willingness to share polling news: Developing and validating a measure of polling distrust and exploring its role.

Manuscripts Under Review & In Progress

Browning, N., Lee, E., Moon, J., & Moon, B. (under review). For the company or the cause?: How fit and political partisanship influence economic and ethical outcomes of corporate social responsibility and organizational advocacy.

Lin, Z., Moon, J., & Chung, S. (under review). Conformity to behaviors of others or projection of self behavior onto others?: A critical examination of the model of influence of presumed influence.

Moon, J., & Lee, S. H.^* (in progress). Trust in the bylines: Perceived credibility of AI-generated vs. journalist-created news. (^*denotes equal contribution)

Moon, J., & Peifer, J. T. (in progress; accepted for the 2025 ICA conference presentation). Public forums or echo chambers? A comparative study of news and social media in the U.S. and South Korea.

Peifer, J. T., Moon, J., Lee, T., & Song, H. (in progress; presented at the 2024 AEJMC conference). Affinities for competing knowledge systems: Perceived news media importance and social media importance across cultural contexts.

Peifer, J. T., Moon, J., & Song, H. (in progress; presented at the 2024 AEJMC conference). A cross-national replication of perceived news media importance: Further validating and expanding a measure for understanding valuations of normative journalism roles.

Peer-Reviewed Journal Publications.

Moon, J., & Peifer, J. T. (2024). Explaining mainstream news media use in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic: The roles of partisanship, perceptions of threat, negative emotions, and news media trust. Mass Communication and Society. https://doi.org/10.1080/15205436.2024.2366228

Moon, J., & Peifer, J. T. (2024). Antecedents to perceived news media importance and motivations for newspaper use: A needs-based framework. Newspaper Research Journal, 45(2), 209-228. https://doi.org/10.1177/07395329241242820

Heo, Y. J., Moon, J., Jones-Jang, S. M., & Chung, S. (2024) Why do people underestimate polling effects? Examining the gap between actual and perceived polling effects. Mass Communication and Society. https://doi.org/10.1080/15205436.2024.2308840

Moon, J., & Chung, S. (2018). Testing overestimation of polling effect on other voters and underestimation of polling effect on oneself: Perceived and actual bandwagon and underdog effect of election polls. Korean Journal of Journalism and Communication Studies, 62(3), 7-36. https://doi.org/10.20879/kjjcs.2018.62.3.001

Chung, S., Heo, Y. J., & Moon, J. (2018). Perceived versus actual polling effects: Biases in perceptions of election poll effects on candidate evaluations. International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 30, 420-442. http://doi.org/10.1093/ijpor/edx004

Selected Conference Presentations.

Moon, J., & Peifer, J. T. (June 12-16, 2025). Public forums or echo chambers? A comparative study of news and social media in the U.S. and South Korea. Paper accepted for presentation at the 75^th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association, Denver, CO.

Peifer, J. T., Moon, J., Lee, T., & Song, H. (August 10, 2024). Affinities for competing knowledge systems: Perceived news media importance and social media importance across cultural contexts. Paper presented at the Annual Conference of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, Philadelphia, PA.

Peifer, J. T., Moon, J., & Song, H. (August 10, 2024). A cross-national replication of perceived news media importance: Further validating and expanding a measure for understanding valuations of normative journalism roles. Paper presented at the Annual Conference of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, Philadelphia, PA.

Moon, J. (January 19, 2024). Developing a new measure of polling distrust. Democracy in flux: Political communication across borders and boundaries, Virtual Symposium co-hosted by IU’s Europe Gateway, The Media School, and Freie Universität Berlin’s Institute for Media and Communication Studies .

Heo, Y. J., Chung, S., & Moon, J. (May 21-25, 2020). When private opinion meets public opinion: Actual impact and biases in poll effect perceptions. Paper presented at the 70th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association. Gold Coast, Australia (Changed to online presentation).

Moon, J., & Chung, S. (May 28, 2019). Actual versus perceived polling effects on candidate evaluation: Underestimated effect on oneself but overestimated effect on other voters. Paper presented at the 69th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association, Washington, D.C.

Moon, J. (November 7, 2015). The effect of election poll reports on voter’s candidate evaluation: The difference between the actual effect and the perceived effect. Paper presented at the Annual Conference of the Korean Associations for Broadcasting and Telecommunication Studies, Yongin, Korea. [Top Student Paper Award]

Chung, S., Heo, Y. J. & Moon, J. (August 7, 2015) The actual and perceived effects of election poll coverage on candidate evaluations. Paper presented at the Annual Conference of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, San Francisco, CA.

Heo, Y. J., & Moon, J. (February 9, 2015). The actual and perceived effect of election poll coverage on candidate evaluations of self and others. Paper presented at the Graduate Students’ Conference of the Korean Society for Journalism and Communication Studies, Daejeon, Korea.