Bio:
Dr. Suellen Hopfer is an Assistant Professor in Public Healt at the University of California, Irvine. The Hopfer research group conducts health communication research to advance communication theory, address health disparities, design effective public health communication interventions, and implement multi-component prevention interventions efficiently to bring about improved health for communities and individuals. Research explores how messaging at the individual, community, or policy level impacts recommended health behavior change, attitudes, and/or policy support related to vaccination and climate change. Contexts in which messaging is researched ranges from clinical/medical settings (e.g., patient-provider conversations, practitioner communication) to community settings (community air pollution impacts or disaster response) to social media contexts (intergenerational family communication and its impact on cancer screening behaviors to pandemic or disaster response and real-time public reaction). The Hopfer research group also investigates and implements communication strategies to reach subgroups of the population with tailored messaging taking cultural, linguistic, contextual, social network, and relational considerations into account. Quantitative and qualitative research methods are employed to explore relevant research questions.