Dr. Helen Wangis an award-winning communication scholar and changemaker dedicated to a singular mission: leveraging powerful storytelling, emerging technologies, and communication networks to inspire and facilitate positive social and behavior change.

The Art of the Oxymoron

Dr. Wang describes her research through the lens of creative tension. She specializes in fields that bridge worlds: entertainment-education,  serious games, positive deviance, and liberating structures. By blending the playful with the purposeful, she helps create transformative stories that empower communities to make different choices that can change their realities.

Driving Climate Solutions

Dr. Wang co-edited the 2024 volume, Storytelling to Accelerate Climate Solutions, published by Springer Nature. This book—accessed over 187,000 times in under two years—unites practitioners and scholars across different fields such as education, literature, journalism, and popular media, to share their knowledge, experience, and insight about how stories can be designed and told to engage, enable, and empower individuals and communities in climate communication and action.

Current Research Project

As a2025-2026 Fulbright U.S. Scholar in Norway, Dr. Wang is currently exploring the future of human-machine developing communication at the University of Inland Norway (INN) Game School. In collaboration with UPEXRE at INN, Bergen Aquarium, Aurora Vortex, University of Bergen, Parallel World Labs, and Studio Fountainbird, she is exploring the potential of using avatars as storytelling agents for change.