World War II had a tremendous impact on the field of communication since it brought to the United States such immigrant scholars from Europe as Kurt Lewin, Paul F. Lazarsfeld, and Theodor Adorno; it attracted US scholars like Carl I. Hovland and Harold D. Laswell to communication research; and it connected these scholars who were to launch the field of communication study into a dense network. Thus an invisible college of communication scholars came together in Washinton, D.C. They met in formal conferences and informally in carpools, on military bases, and in federal government offices. Communication was considered crucial in informing the American public about the nation’s war-time goals, and the details of food and gas rationing and other war-related concerns.
So in 1943, when Dr. Wilbur Schramm returned to Iowa from his wartime duties in Washington D.C., he had a vision to found the first PhD program in mass communication and the first communication research. He organized the PhD program while he was director of the Iowa Journalism school. Schramm was influenced by those scholars who were conducting communication research connected with World War II. This brought together scholars from psychology, sociology, and political science to form the new field of communication. Wilbur Schramm was considered to be the founder of communication study and is the central figure in its history.
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