About

Ejae Lee, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of Public Relations in the Department of Mass Communication, Advertising and Public Relations at Boston University. Her research examines how organizations can communicate authentically with stakeholders to foster trust and build sustainable public relationships across global contexts. She focuses particularly on prosocial corporate communication, aiming to advance both theory and practice in public relations while offering actionable insights for communication professionals. Dr. Lee leads international research projects on authenticity and corporate social advocacy in the era of artificial intelligence. She serves as a Research Fellow at the Arthur W. Page Center at Penn State University and as a core partner in the Sustainability and Stakeholder Management of Crisis Communication Think Tank at the University of Georgia. Her work has been published in leading journals in public relations and communication, including Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, Journal of Public Relations Research, Public Relations Review, Management Communication Quarterly, and Journal of Public Relations Education. In the classroom, Dr. Lee teaches Digital Media and Public Relations (CM443) and Brand Communication and Consumer Analytics (CM431), integrating research-driven insights and data analytics with practical applications to prepare the next generation of communication leaders.

Research topics

• Computer Science
• Political Science
• Social psychology
• Psychology
• Public relations
• Sociology
• Knowledge management
• Marketing
• Law
• Business

Selected publications

• Organization-issue dynamics: a conceptual model for strategic communication management of sociopolitical challenges

  Journal of Communication Management · 2026-03-17

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Purpose This study proposes a conceptual model of organization-issue dynamics that explicates how organizations identify, sustain and recalibrate their stances on sociopolitical issues. The model reconceptualizes stance-taking as a dynamic process shaped by a connection between an organization and a given sociopolitical issue, involving interactions, transactions, exchanges and negotiations. Design/methodology/approach Employing theory synthesis, this conceptual work integrates grand public relations theories – specifically the contingency theory of strategic conflict management and issue management – with emerging frameworks on organizational advocacy, crisis READINESS, strategic silence and cross-cultural conflict. The model is further illustrated through a real-world case. Findings The OID model is anchored by two central dimensions – organizational commitment and issue complexity – whose intersections define distinct positions and stances. Positioning is governed by a stance calculus in which situational, organizational and environmental factors shape decision thresholds. Organizational identity-issue congruence, legitimacy pressures and stakeholder feedback loops explain how organizations oscillate among advocacy, accommodation and strategic silence. Practical implications The model provides a diagnostic tool for communication leaders to evaluate, forecast, and optimize strategic positioning on sociopolitical issues, aligning organizational values with stakeholder expectations across global contexts. Originality/value By conceptualizing organization-issue dynamics as an interactive relationship between an organization and an issue, the study advances communication management theory and offers a framework for future empirical validation.

  PublisherDOI

• Corporate Social Advocacy (CSA) and Authenticity: Communicating Values and Social Impact

  Palgrave practical guides in communication. · 2026-01-01

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Authenticity in Corporate Social Advocacy

  2026-01-15

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  This chapter focuses on the significance of authenticity in corporate social advocacy (CSA) from a public relations perspective. CSA initiatives yield tangible outcomes that contribute to relationship quality, organizational reputation, and financial performance. When publics perceive an organization’s CSA communication as lacking authenticity, the effect of the CSA practice may be compromised, diluting its sense of genuine commitment to social change. Therefore, it is imperative to convey CSA initiatives to diverse publics in an authentic manner. This chapter investigates the definitions of authenticity in CSA and explores the construct’s core conceptual components. Furthermore, it focuses on the impacts of public perceptions of authenticity in CSA, in particular through the lens of relationship building, and explores the effects on reputational, financial, and societal outcomes. Building on the comprehension of the concept and influence of authenticity in CSA, this chapter presents recent examples of authentic CSA to demonstrate how theoretical and sociolegal insights are applied in public relations practice. This chapter concludes with a discussion on the future directions for authenticity in CSA, emphasizing potential areas for research and initiative development in the field of public relations.

  PublisherDOI

• Advancing Crisis READINESS in a Global Context: Exploring Theoretical Development and Adaptation of Crisis Communication in Asia

  Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management · 2026-05-11

  article1st authorCorresponding

  ABSTRACT This study investigates theoretical developments in crisis communication within the Asian context and examines how these contributions inform and expand global understandings of crisis READINESS. Drawing on a comprehensive review of 125 empirical studies published between 1995 and 2025 in leading communication journals, it explores the application, adaptation and innovation of theoretical frameworks in Asian crisis scholarship. While foundational theories, such as situational crisis communication theory and image repair theory, remain influential, research in the Asian context has increasingly contextualized and extended these frameworks to reflect region‐specific sociopolitical, cultural and media environments. Through a READINESS‐guided content analysis, the findings identify opportunities to more fully align prevailing patterns in Asian research with core READINESS dimensions, particularly in emotional leadership, team‐level coordination and crisis spillover. Highlighting the need for a more conceptually integrated and culturally grounded approach to crisis communication, this study proposes a forward‐looking research agenda that synthesizes Asian crisis contexts with the multidimensional READINESS framework to advance global crisis communication theory and practice.

  PublisherDOI

• Perceived Authenticity in Corporate Social Advocacy: Conceptualization and Measurement Scale Development

  Journal of Public Relations Research · 2024-12-16 · 15 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Effects of Authenticity in Organizational Advocacy for Polarizing Issues

  Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly · 2024-11-16 · 12 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  This study focuses on the impact of authenticity in organizational advocacy for polarizing sociopolitical issues. The study examined how individual publics’ perceptions of authenticity influence the quality of the relationship between an organization and the public, as well as the level of support for the organization. The study also compared these effects across different polarizing sociopolitical issues. Through an online survey ( N = 387), findings revealed a positive association between authenticity in organizational advocacy and the quality of an organization’s relationship with individuals, which led to increased support. Furthermore, the multigroup analysis highlighted the heightened importance of authenticity when organizations advocate for more polarizing issues.

  PublisherDOI

• Authentic Crisis Leadership Inside and Out:Synthesizing Across Reputation, Renewal, and Relationships Toward Resilience

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2024-01-01

  preprintOpen access
  PublisherDOI

• A Test of a Dual Model of Positive and Negative EORs: Dialogic Employee Communication Perceptions Related to Employee-Organization Relationships and Employee Megaphoning Intentions¹

  Journal of Public Relations Research · 2023-03-29 · 22 citations

  article

  This study investigated how employees’ perceptions of an organization’s dialogic employee communication influence their evaluations of their positive and negative relationships with the organization. The study further examined how employees’ relationship assessments could drive their intentions for positive and negative megaphoning about their organizations. To test the differentiating effects of dialogic employee communication on positive and negative employee-organization relationships (EORs) and, subsequently, employee megaphoning intentions, we used a dual measure with the positive and the negative EORs. The online survey of 527 full-time U.S. employees showed that dialogic employee communication – particularly mutuality orientation – distinctively influenced the employees’ EOR assessments. The survey results also showed that stronger and more-positive EORs led to increased positive megaphoning intentions, and that stronger and more-negative EORs led to increased negative megaphoning intentions. This study found that positive EOR mediated the links between dialogic employee communication and both positive and negative intentions, but that negative EOR mediated only the link between dialogic employee communication and the negative megaphoning intention.

  PublisherDOI

• The effects of leadership in corporate social advocacy on positive employee outcomes

  Journal of Public Relations Research · 2022-09-22 · 37 citations

  articleSenior author

  Despite the growing attention to corporate social advocacy in the extant literature, little empirical research has examined the effects of corporate social advocacy in the context of employees. The purpose of this study was to delve into the impact of leadership in corporate social advocacy (CSA) on positive employee outcomes, using data from an online survey of full-time employees working in various corporations in the United States. Controlling for the participants’ tenure, demographic information, and company size, this study found that leaders’ facilitation of corporate social advocacy strongly influenced employee advocacy for their organizations, which was also significantly mediated by employees’ personal identification with the leader and by employee–organization relationship (EOR) quality.

  PublisherDOI

• We’re All in This Together: Legitimacy and Coronavirus-Oriented CSR Messaging

  Sustainability · 2022-02-22 · 13 citations

  articleOpen access

  This study investigates how legitimization strategies embedded in CSR messages related to the COVID-19 pandemic influenced multidimensional stakeholder assessments of reputation. The results of this 3 × 2 × 2 experimental survey, which manipulated pragmatic and moral legitimacy using three conditions (self- vs. other- vs. both-oriented messaging); substantive and symbolic management (informative vs. uninformative content); and popularization and standardization approaches (leadership vs. followership), indicate that popularization strategies communicated substantively and standardization strategies communicated symbolically generally yield the greatest reputational gains. More nuanced findings from three-way interaction effects are further discussed, with an emphasis on the role of double-sided messages seeking to simultaneously establish pragmatic and moral legitimacy.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Sung‐Un Yang

  Boston University

  8 shared

• Young Kim

  Duke University

  6 shared

• Minjeong Kang

  5 shared

• Nicholas Browning

  Indiana University Bloomington

  3 shared

• Tae-Young Kim

  Yonsei University

  2 shared

• Young Eun Park

  Sookmyung Women's University

  2 shared

• Sung Hyun Lee

  Sungkyunkwan University

  1 shared

• Ryan Collins

  Indiana University Bloomington

  1 shared

Education

• Ph.D., Public Relations

  University of Southern California

  2016

• M.A., Public Relations

  University of Southern California

  2012

• B.A., Communication Studies

  University of California, Los Angeles

  2010