Jeanette B. Ruiz

Education

• Ph.D., Communication, University of California, Davis, 2015
• M.A., Communication, Sacramento State University, 2009

About

In addition to her appointment in the Department of Communication, Dr. Ruiz has served as a human resources and public relations consultant for nonprofit, managed health care, and finance organizations. She draws on this professional experience to connect communication theory and research to real-world practice in her teaching and mentorship. Dr. Ruiz serves as the First-Generation Initiative Faculty Lead, is a CAMPOS Faculty Scholar, and is a recipient of the UC Davis Distinguished Teaching Award.

Research Focus

Dr. Ruiz’s research examines how communication systems structure information exposure and shape health-related beliefs, trust, and decision-making in conditions of uncertainty. Her earlier work on vaccine hesitancy and public health communication investigated how interpersonal and online information environments influence trust in health guidance and willingness to adopt recommended behaviors.

Building on this foundation, her current research extends to algorithmically mediated media environments and youth-focused communication contexts, examining how exposure to online and social media content—including health-related and stereotypical representations—shapes perceptions of self and others. Across projects, she integrates survey methods, network analysis, and computational approaches to understand how communication structures organize exposure and influence belief formation across diverse media ecosystems.

Publications

• Ruiz, J. B., Flores, P. M., & Barnett, G. A. (2025). Journal of Studies in International Education. Advance online publication.
• Carter, M. C., Cingel, D. P., Ruiz, J. B., & Wartella, E. (2023). Social media use in the context of the Personal Social Media Ecosystem Framework. Journal of Communication, 73(1), 25–37.
• Ruiz, J. B., & Bell, R. A. (2022). Parental COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy in the United States. Public Health Reports, 137(6), 1162–1169.
• Ruiz, J. B., & Bell, R. A. (2021). Predictors of intention to vaccinate against COVID-19: Results of a nationwide survey. Vaccine, 39(7), 1080–1086.
• Ruiz, J. B., Featherstone, J. D., & Bell, R. A. (2021). Identifying vaccine hesitant communities on Twitter and their geolocations: A network approach. In Proceedings of the 54th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS).

Teaching

Jeanette B. Ruiz teaches various courses, including Interpersonal Communication Competence, Introduction to Mass Communication, Introduction to Communication, Strategic Communication in Public Relations, Race and Media, and Empirical Research Methods. She was appointed as the First Gen Initiative Faculty Lead and serves as a First Gen Student Mentor, UndocuAlly, Athletics Mentor, and Guardian Scholar Mentor. She has presented on the importance of instructor presence, best practices for remote teaching, strategies for designing equitable online learning environments, and online universal design features.

Awards

• Distinguished Teaching Award
• National Communication Association International and Intercultural Communication Division (IICD) Honors, Graduate Student Seminar Recipient, 2014