Assistant Professor James Bonus published his research focusing on the impact of media on children and college students. An article published in Human Communication Research presented findings from a content analysis of science television programs for children and an experiment that found children showed more knowledge after watching episodes containing anthropomorphic (humanlike) depictions of science concepts. Another article in Computers in Human Behavior discussed an experiment with children using interactive touchscreens while viewing episodes and found that children aged 3-5 can learn from a socioemotional narrative with interactivity.

Bonus' articles published in Communication Research presented findings on the effect of listening to nostalgic music on college students’ well-being and prosocial media effects on children.