Erika Franklin Fowler, Ph.D, is an assistant professor of government at Wesleyan University.  She previously was a Robert Wood Johnson Scholar in Health Policy Research at the University of Michigan. Professor Fowler specializes in political communication, especially broadcast news and campaign advertising, and her work on local television has been published in communication, law/policy, and medical journals. Professor Fowler earned her Ph.D. in political science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she served for five years as the research director of the University of Wisconsin NewsLab, one of the largest, most systematic local news tracking projects in the country. She is the author of several book chapters on political communication and has published articles in Stanford Law & Policy Review and The American Journal of Managed Care. Professor Fowler is also a partner with Capitol Opinion, a Wisconsin-based polling and research firm. She is currently working on a book about the content and effect of local broadcast election coverage, as well as several projects investigating the role of health communication on policy opinions among the public.