One of the best ways to identify melanoma is using the ugly duckling sign (UDS) technique. The UDS technique teaches patients to look for the “ugly duckling” – a mole that is atypical for the patient. You can see HCAT Lab’s new UDS brochure and pamphlet here.
HCAT Lab develops innovative materials to help patients identify melanoma, including patient brochures, pamphlets, and videos. We recently completed a series of studies that yielded new materials to teach patients how to identify melanoma using the ABCDE technique. You can read more about the materials, and download them here.
HCAT presented multiple papers at NCA 2021, including a Top Paper in the Health Communication Division. Led by Manu Pokharel, the manuscript reported the results of biophysiological research of UV imagery. Pokharel, M., Jensen, J. D., John, K. K., Christy, K. R., Taylor-Burton, S., & Upshaw, S. (2021, November). Visual communication and skin cancer prevention:…
Dr. Helen Lillie is an NIH Postdoctoral Fellow in HCAT Lab, and she has been publishing up a storm. Her primary research program focuses on communication and emotion. Helen has published lead-authored articles in Psychology & Health, Journal of Family Communication, and a book chapter in Communicating Science in Times of Crisis: Coronavirus. All of…
Manusheela “Manu” Pokharel (Ph.D., 2019) was recently awarded the Gerald R. Miller Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation Award from the National Communication Association. Pokharel received her doctorate in communication in May 2019 from the University of Utah and is currently an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Texas State University. The Gerald R. Miller award…
HCAT won funding from the Immunology, Inflammation, and Infectious Disease Initiative (i3) at the University of Utah. The funding provides support for a repeated, cross sectional study that will track perceptions of COVID communication across 18 weeks. Notably, we are interested in whether people felt COVID messages were exaggerated. HCAT members Andy J. King (Iowa…
Several years ago, HCAT published an article focused on cancer information overload (CIO). In that article, we proposed a measure for the construct, examined psychometric properties, and compared it to Powe’s measure of cancer fatalism. As a follow-up, we recently published another article examining a refined version of the CIO scale. Both articles can be…
Kevin John, Manu, Jay, Jor, and I attended an amazing Real Salt Lake game versus the LA Galaxy. Real won 6 to 2 and, most important of all, we all won free haircuts. Why? If Real scores 3 goals, then all ticket holders win a free haircut. It’s amazing.
HCAT lab had another writing retreat. In August 2018, we headed to Chicago for the glorious 5 day retreat. Five days! It was amazing.
Our house was a small mansion located just north of Chicago. We were told that the house was once owned by Chief Keef. I’m not sure if that story is true, but we decided to name it the Keef House.
We ate deep dish pizza, put post-it notes on the walls to track progress, and worked, worked, worked. Nick made salmon one night. Jake didn’t sleep.
The Keef House writing retreat was hosted by Courtney Scherr and Lisa Guntzviller. It was one of the best retreats of all time.
We’ve been writing lots of grants this summer: two R01s, a P30, a DP2 supplement, and several R03s. Summer is often a great time for us to develop grants. So far, we’ve met every week (or thereabouts) and had some amazing brainstorming sessions. I’m excited to see how these ideas evolve over the months ahead.
Every year, NIH New Innovators are invited to Bethesda to present our research. This year, I presented some of our work on UV photography. We were the first poster visible through the door of the session. The face of the symposium, if you will. 🙂
Manu will attend the NCA Doctoral Honors Seminar in July 2018 at Vanderbilt University. She will present all three studies from her dissertation program, and work to refine the project for the job market. NCA Doctoral Honors Seminar
Kate hopped the pond and attended ICA in Prague. While there, she presented HCAT’s research on parasocial interactions and HIV stigma. In that research line, we evaluate the CDC’s PSA campaign designed to reduce HIV stigma. *This was an article we wrote at the 2017 HCAT writing retreat.
If you ran into a lab member in March, then we probably looked busy. And Jake was definitely drinking some form of caffeine. That’s because we were working hard to get 7 article submitted to 2 different conferences. The end of March is home to the submission deadline for the National Communication Association (NCA) and…
HCAT has lots of research in progress. We are writing IRBs, designing studies, collecting and analyzing data, and writing manuscripts. It’s great to have so much activity in the lab. Recently, I started using post-it notes to keep track of all the studies in progress. It helps me to visually track the studies and it…
Manu successfully defended her prospectus on February 7th, 2018. In HCAT lab, the prospectus defense is a cumulative process that builds on the comprehensive exams and the preprospectus. Her next, and final, meeting is the dissertation defense. Manu’s dissertation consists of three studies: a meta-analysis, a large visual communication experiment, and a biophysiological lab experiment.…
We love to go to Sundance Film Festival each year because (1) it is awesome, (2) it is nearby – Park City, UT), and (3) it is a wonderful opportuunity to learn about cutting edge communication technology (e.g., VR and AR). Sundance is approximately 11 days long and the lab was out and about the…
We just found out our 2017 publication in Risk Analysis was selected as a best article by the editors. The article is: Jensen, J. D., Pokharel, M., Scherr, C. L., King, A. J., Brown, N., & Jones, C. (2017). Communicating uncertainty to the public: How amount and source of uncertainty impact fatalism, backlash, and overload.…
Once again, HCAT lab hosted a writing retreat in beautiful Park City, UT. The writing retreat was October 11th – 14th, 2017. The attendees were Lisa Guntzviller, Andy King, Courtney Scherr, Kevin K. John, Manusheela Pokharel, Chelsea Ratcliff, Kaylee Crossley, Katheryn Christy, Hannah Badal, Kevin Coe, and Brandon Rivera-Melo. We missed Rob Yale (a lot).…
Every HCAT writing retreat begins with an roundtable session where attendees detail what they will be working on. Typically, the roundtable is led by Jake, but this year, in honor of the 30yh anniversary of The Princess Bride, it was led by the Dread Professor Jensen. He told attendees to “work hard, submit manuscripts” as…
Manusheela completed her comprehensive exams on June 16th, 2017, after 4 weeks of intense writing. Her dissertation program focuses on visual health communication. Congrats Manu!
Kate Christy recently published an article evaluating how admiration and memorability impact the processing of mammography PSAs. The research was published in the Journal of Health Communication (one of our favorite outlets!) and provides evidence that admired models have greater impact on intentions…
HCAT lab recently purchased a biophysiological measurement system from iMotions. The system allows us to measure eye movements, emotional response, and heart rate (among others). We’ve been interested in biophysiological measurement for years, and have conducted several eye tracking studies via the labs at Texas Tech (Andy King) and BYU (Kevin John). But now we…
In Fall 2016 I taught a 7000-level grad seminar called Communication Theory. Ten wonderful grads were in the class, including MA and PhD students. We spent the semester exploring constructs and practicing how to think more abstractly. I used immersion as a practice construct as it is both timely and enduring. The students learned how…
HCAT lab held another writing retreat October 12th – 16th, 2016 in Park City, UT. The writing retreat was held at a 5 bedroom house located just above main street in old town (you can rent it here). Fourteen people attended the retreat, including folks from Texas, Illinois, and Maryland. We had two research groups at the retreat: a skin cancer research group and a psychological reactance group. Both groups wrote manuscripts, analyzed data, and designed future studies.
The 2016 retreat also saw two different trips to the emergency room. Jake was in the emergency room when one of his sons developed a nasty case of parainfluenza. Kevin John ended up in the emergency room with appendicitis!
Despite these obstacles, the retreat was a huge success. We wrote from the moment the house opened on the 12th until 2 am in the morning the night of the 15th. Lisa Guntzviller led a workshop on building tables in Excel, and Jake led a workshop on the Johnson-Neyman (JN) technique.
The tattoo sleeves made a second appearance too. As folks finished papers, they were rewarded with the awesome sleeves. Nick Carcioppolo and Rob Yale weren’t able to make it this year, so we made Nick and Rob paper cutouts – and enjoyed taking crazy photos with them.
It was another wonderful writing retreat!
June is a major deadline for NIH. Given that, HCAT spends most of May and the beginning of June writing and submitting grants. This year, Manu, Chelsea, Jeremy, and I worked on 3 grants (all due mid-June). Two R21 grants, and one P30 grant. It can be exhausting, but the students also learn how to write grants by helping to put together all of the components. 
Manusheela Pokharel had a manuscript accepted to the National Communication Association (NCA) convention in Philadelphia, PA. Her paper was written at our Fall 2015 writing retreat!
HCAT lab held another writing retreat October 8th – 15th, 2015 in Park City, UT. The writing retreat was held at a 5 bedroom house located just above main street in old town (you can rent it here). Courtney and I gave a workshop on writing NIH grants, and we also reviewed vitas and (for…