Alumna Educates Public About Pressing Health Issues

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CDC’s Katherine Lyon Daniel is this year’s School of Social Ecology commencement speaker

The work Katherine Lyon Daniel did on her dissertation — focused on communicating risks to policymakers and long-term health impacts — while she was a doctoral student at the University of California, Irvine, has had practical implications throughout her career over the past couple decades at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

“I really feel that my Ph.D. in social ecology set me on the path to work at the CDC although I didn’t know it at the time,” she says. “I was very concerned with not just studying problems that affect people but also solving them, and that was always a part of what I studied when I was at UCI. The skills that I learned, I take with me.”

She’ll bring them back and share her experiences and advice on making a difference with graduating students June 16 during the School of Social Ecology’s commencement ceremony.

When she joined the CDC as an epidemiologist/behavioral scientist in the birth defects prevention branch in 1996, Daniel immediately started doing work in areas requiring risk communication, including leading its landmark campaign to increase folic acid consumption among women of child-bearing age.

“My first task was communicating risk to pregnant women and women who could get pregnant,” Daniel recalls. “It was an incredible challenge to help women understand that this risk was something over which they had some measure of control. We had to convince them to take folic acid vitamins throughout their reproductive lifespan to prevent certain birth defects. We partnered with the March of Dimes and got voluntary folic acid consumption up 10 percent higher than it was prior to the campaign.”

Another successful campaign led by Daniel was the government’s first communication campaign to support early autism screening.

The “Learn the Signs. Act Early” campaign, launched in 2005. By communicating risks and benefits of early recognition of signs for autism and getting children screened, the campaign focused on early identification of developmental delay and disability by engaging parents, public health and healthcare partners, so that families get the services and support they need as early as possible.

Since she was named to her current role as associate director for communication for the CDC in 2011, Daniel oversees the agency’s communication for disease prevention, health protection and crisis response. She has worked to develop innovative and effective strategies to share information during a crisis, such as the ebola outbreak in Africa, and using digital and traditional media to inform people worldwide about myriad serious health concerns.

During her travel to Africa, Daniel felt the intense impact of the devastating effects of the Ebola virus, and after returning she heightened the CDC’s focus on clear, concise, and graphically visual communication so that people could understand the risks, and what they should do.   

She employs data and communication science for her job, taking into account world cultures and customs and is sensitive to people’s varying needs.

“The No. 1 thing is to have and show empathy,” she explains. “In a crisis, empathy allows you to express your understanding of people’s feelings. And, that’s part of effective communication. You use all the research methods, whether qualitative or quantitative or multi-method, to help you communicate your messages, but your personal connection, your empathy, helps you maintain your credibility, and that’s so important.”

Daniel continues to foster the crisis and emergency risk communication principles which the CDC uses during a crisis, and works to accelerate the agency’s role in digital media to combat misinformation.

About Katherine Lyon Daniel

Residence: Atlanta, Georgia

Family: husband, Garrison; children Alden, 21, and Aidan, 14; dog, Princess Love Ninja

Education: B.A. in psychology from the University of Virginia; Ph.D. in social ecology from UCI

Dissertation: “Public Policy Risk Discounting: Factors Influencing US Senate Decisions.” Chair: Elaine Vaughan, the late professor emerita of psychology and social behavior

Professional purpose: To communicate and inspire compassion

Favorite quote: “I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish humble tasks as though they were great and noble. The world is moved along, not only by the mighty shoves of its heroes, but also by the aggregate of the tiny pushes of each honest worker.” — Helen Keller, scholar, author and activist who was deaf and blind

Favorite cause: “CDC works 24/7” to save lives and protect people’s health around the world

Advice to students: “Make a choice, make a statement, make a difference.”  

On UCI: “The dynamic development that the UCI academic campus and network has undergone since I came to campus 30 years ago represents fulfillment of an exciting vision. I didn’t necessarily see all the potential while I was there but, I’m so proud to have been a part of translating that vision into a career helping others.”

— by Mimi Ko Cruz

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