Media Entertainment

(Ph.D., Michigan State University) is an Associate Professor of Journalism and Creative Media Industries at Texas Tech University. His research focuses on the psychological and sociological impacts of communication technologies—specifically digital media—and how these impacts have influenced the human communication process. Nick has authored or co-authored nearly four dozen original empirical studies and a dozen book chapters on the subject, with much of his work focused on video games and social media applications. He currently serves on the editorial board of several research journals, including Media Psychology and New Media & Society, is an editor with Journal of Media Psychology , and contributes regularly as a reviewer for the American Library Association’s CHOICE Magazine. In 2016, he was awarded a WVU Foundation Outstanding Teacher award, and was also named a 2016 Eberly College of Arts and Sciences Outstanding Teacher. In 2020, he was named Fulbright Wu Jing-Jyi Arts and Culture Fellow by the Foundation for Scholarly Exchange in Taipei, Taiwan.

Nick is a native of St. Louis, where he split his time between the bohemian bustle of University City and the creeks and hollers of suburban-rural Jefferson County. After graduating from the University of Missouri-St. Louis (B.A., ’03; M.A., ’04) he worked as a newspaper reporter and in government relations before leaving the state to pursue his doctorate. He currently lives in the heart of Morgantown, West Virginia with his partner—in research, in the lab, and in life—Jaime. Both are avid travelers and collectors of history and popular culture artifacts, and when they’re not in the office (physically or digitally), they can usually be found on the road, searching the country (here or abroad) for remnants of entertainment culture past and present to add to their expanding collection of comic books, video games, and movie posters.