Sela Sar

Dr. Sela Sar serves as a Professor in the Charles H. Sandage Department of Advertising and the Institute of Communications Research within the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign's College of Media. Her research bridges advertising theory with psychological frameworks to decode consumer emotional responses.

Her primary research focuses on Mood Psychology (100% fingerprint weight), investigating how positive/negative emotions (30-28% weight), message framing (24% weight), and logos (20% weight) shape ad effectiveness. Recent work explores cutting-edge intersections like affective computing in emotion measurement and virtual reality's role in enhancing empathy for social causes, particularly in public service announcements targeting homelessness.

Over the past five years, her scholarship reveals a clear trajectory toward technologically augmented advertising research—integrating VR, computational emotion models, and social media analytics—while maintaining core focus on fundamental psychological mechanisms. This evolution reflects industry shifts toward immersive and data-driven advertising solutions.

Dr. Sar actively collaborates across disciplines, with co-authors spanning communication studies, computer science, and social psychology. Her 39 research outputs—including 37 articles—demonstrate sustained scholarly productivity, cited across academic and industry contexts as evidenced by Mendeley readership and social media engagement.