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Professor of Political Communication, Bournemouth University

Described by one BBC journalist as 'a man who watches Westminster', Dr Lilleker is a lecturer and researcher in political communication with particular interests in political party and candidate communication and the link to citizen and voter engagement.

Currently leading or contributing to units covering political communication, communication theory and reception theory with options offered across the final year of the CMC framework.

In addition, Dr Lilleker is Director of the Centre for Public Communication Research and Head of Research within the CMC academic group; Chair of the PSA Political Marketing Specialist Group; Panel Convenor for Political Communication for the ECPR and a member of ECREA.

Dr Lilleker's research concerns both the professionalisation, marketization and strategic development of political communication and the impacts upon citizen engagement.

His research has covered local election campaigning and the impact upon voter choices; and party, candidate and MP's usage of the Internet, from websites to social media, and correlations between usage and gaining support.

He was involved in two FP7 consortiums exploring how social media could be an agent within conflict resolution and is currently leading a project exploring online political engagement in the context of the 2014 European parliamentary election.

In addition to empirical works, he has just completed a manuscript on political cognition which explores how citizens respond to political communication which draws on theories from consumer psychology as well as psephological studies.

Experience

  • –present
    Associate Professor of Political Communication, Bournemouth University