Autumn Boyer Advises Nationally Recognized Health Center
What types of visual images are most effective in motivating healthy behavior change? How can health messages be crafted so that older adults find them persuasive? These were some of the questions that communication doctoral student Autumn Boyer tackled in her role as communication consultant for the Center for Healthy Aging (CHA), a Centers for Disease Control Prevention Program housed in the University of Pittsburgh's Graduate School of Public Health.
This summer, the CHA is piloting a new manual to educate and motivate peer leaders for its community education class on "The 10 Keys to Healthy Aging." Boyer helped CHA through the manual’s revision process by applying insights that she generated from research conducted for a fall 2005 Ph.D. directed study under the guidance of associate professor Gordon Mitchell. The impetus for the directed study project arose when public health professor Lewis Kuller, past co-principal investigator at the CHA, approached Mitchell about the possibility of collaboration. Kuller was interested in applying evidence-based communication practices to ensure that the CHA’s community health research efforts would be as efficacious as possible.
After spending a term researching the health communication literature, Boyer applied her knowledge of rhetoric to the practical task undertaken by the CHA leadership. "The CHA faced the challenge of incorporating lots of information, but doing it persuasively," said Boyer. "Through the revision process, we incorporated photographs of people demonstrating healthy habits, which was an improvement over the previous use of clip-art. In the chapter about maintaining social contact I recommended incorporating a picture of social connection among people who are not related, since not all members of the target audience are connected to their families." The newest revision features a photo of three women pausing to rest on a pier while out for a walk together, which replaced the family gathering photo.
Boyer's other evidence-based recommendations included incorporating information and examples to accommodate the audience’s various stages of behavior change, providing simple tips for overcoming barriers to change; and avoiding the polarities of stereotypes about older adults. These recommendations, like the example of social connectedness above, are grounded in literature on rhetoric and public health. For example, the decision to use photos that the audience can relate to, instead of general clip-art, implements Kenneth Burke’s concept of rhetorical identification. As Boyer explains in her advisory document, "For health communicators, as well as other persuaders, one goal is to help audiences feel identification with health promoters and engage in healthy and low risk behaviors." In pursuit of this goal, "images or spokespersons that accompany health messages should relate to the cultural aesthetic of the audience in order to help them relate to the information and shape their perceptions of health and health care." The CHA hopes that the application of these communication principles to their printed materials will help them promote healthy aging in Allegheny County in ways that are both scientifically and rhetorically sound.
"We feel very fortunate to have the opportunity of working with Autumn," said CHA Co-Program Director N. Carole Milas. "Her expertise and enthusiasm were great assets to the manual revision process. We now have a great publication designed to promote healthy aging and the '10 Keys' to the community. We are grateful for her assistance."
The initial publication of "The 10 Keys to Healthy Aging" manual was supported by the Jewish Health Care Foundation. Autumn Boyer is pursuing dual degrees in rhetoric and bioethics and has been a member of Pitt’s communication department since 2003.
