Education
Ph.D. Communication, University of Southern California, 2017
M.P.Aff. Public Affairs, University of Texas, Austin, 2009
B.A. Political Science, University of California, Davis, 2006
Biography
Katherine ("Katie") Elder is an Assistant Professor of Health Communication. Prior to joining CI, she worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Texas Health Science Center on a grant-funded project designed to tailor health-related messaging to the needs and beliefs of policymakers. She studies translation and implementation science, focusing specifically on how to bridge the gap between public health research and health policy.
Her research interests are motivated by her work in the public sector. Prior to her doctoral studies, she worked for two years as a program analyst at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Recovery Act Office, where she was responsible for stimulus-created jobs data posted on Recovery.gov. As a doctoral student, Katie worked under the direction of the Chief Science Officer at the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. She has also worked with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on a health communication campaign targeting state legislators and as a graduate intern for the State Department at the U.S. Embassy in Kampala, Uganda.
Katie received her Ph.D. in Health Communication from the University of Southern California, her Masters of Public Affairs from the Lyndon B. Johnson School at the University of Texas at Austin, and her B.A. in Political Science from UC Davis. She enjoys traveling, relentlessly defending the Oxford comma, and, as a California native, spends her free time scuba diving and preparing year-round for Shark Week viewing parties.
Representative Courses Taught
- COMM 200 Introduction to Communication Studies
- COMM 310 Quantitative Research Methods
- COMM 325 Health Media Campaigns
- COMM 441 Health Communication
Scholarship
Keywords
Health Communication, Health Promotion, Translational Research, Implementation Science, Health Literacy, Behavioral Health