Health Communication

Health communication is an area of study that examines how human and mediated communication can influence the outcomes of health-care and health promotion efforts. This core MPH course introduces the students to the basic concepts of health communication and its scholarship, including the focal areas of health literacy and patient-provider communication, social marketing, health campaigns, risk communication, crisis communication, and health advocacy. In the course, students will discuss the ways communicating about health is influenced by individual, social, and societal factors. The course will provide students with tools to critically evaluate existing health campaigns and to outline strategies to effectively communicate with different audiences about health-related topics. They will also design culturally appropriate, evidence-based health messages, designed for specific publics. Through this course, students will also learn how to effectively communicate scientific information with different audiences (e.g., general population, experts, the media), appropriately choosing oral and written materials and communication channels.