Published May 29, 2026
In addition to teaching both undergraduate and graduate courses in health communications, public health policy approaches, and program evaluation, Anne Abbott, assistant professor in the School of Public and Population Health at Boise State University, is working to prevent teen mental health crises in Idaho through a community-academic partnership called Communities for Youth.
Communities for Youth addresses youth mental health challenges, such as depression and suicidal ideation, by shifting community prevention efforts upstream, before crises occur. It’s team of staff, students and faculty, including Abbott, conduct surveys in communities to identify local strengths and needs related to youth well-being and offer tailored training and capacity building.
Three years ago, Abbott earned her PhD from the University of Iowa Department of Community and Behavioral Health in the College of Public Health, with a focus on health communication. During her PhD program, she worked on several projects for the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services, including an evaluation of Iowa’s Rape Prevention Education Program with the UI Injury Prevention Research Center (UI IPRC).
“Being able to work with Communities for Youth has been really exciting because it keeps me engaged in public health practice and allows me to work with a wide range of partners,” she said. “Although my work with the UI IPRC, and with Dr. Kari Harland, was more focused on preventing dating violence and sexual assault, my work with Communities for Youth and PI Dr. Megan Smith has helped me better understand how to prevent multiple forms of violence and other challenges at the same time. This has been a really great extension of my training at UI IPRC.”
Below, Abbott discusses what drew her to violence prevention, some professional skills that advance prevention, and her advice for injury and violence prevention students.
What drew you to violence prevention?
My main research interest is interventions–particularly health-communication focused ones–that prevent violence and harm among teens and young adults. I’m very interested in interventions focused on upstream, or primary prevention, because they have the potential to prevent the greatest amount of harm. Working upstream also helps us address multiple potential issues simultaneously, usually at the population level.
For example, when we help entire schools or districts foster more authentic and meaningful connections between middle school students and teachers or staff, we create environments that can prevent multiple forms of interpersonal violence (e.g., bullying and teen dating violence). That impact is valuable on its own, but it also extends further–we often see improvements in attendance and classroom behavior, as well as self-harm risk factors like low self-esteem, depression, and suicidal ideation.
Primary prevention holds so much promise. Unfortunately, particularly in the violence prevention space, it is often undervalued and under-researched. I committed to doing work in this area because I wanted to help change that.
How do skills related to advocacy, evaluation, and communications advance prevention?
Skills in communication, advocacy, and evaluation are really important in violence prevention, even more so than in other areas of public health. Part of this is because, as I mentioned earlier, the primary prevention of violence remains under-studied. It’s also because applying a public health approach to violence is still relatively new compared to fields like infectious or chronic disease.
As a result, we have to work harder (and smarter!) to help decision makers understand the value of investing in programs and research. We need to communicate strategically with the public about why violence prevention matters and how their communities can benefit from it. On the evaluation side, we must be rigorous in building the evidence base, identifying what works, and clearly communicating those findings.
It’s too easy for folks to assume violence isn’t an issue in their school, community, or workplace. Without strong evidence and effective communication, programs can be dismissed, and decision-makers may hesitate to fund, or may even defund, prevention efforts.
As an interventionist and a behavioral health person, I don’t see many areas of public health, including injury and violence, that don’t benefit from utilizing the scientific, strategic, and creative principles of health communication.
Most interventions aimed at preventing risk or promoting health include a communication component—whether it’s a trainer or health professional delivering key messages verbally, or materials like posters, billboards, websites, or social media posts. These messages need to be thoughtfully designed and delivered to maximize their impact, and this is exactly what health communications professionals do.
Health communication also plays a key role in public health advocacy and communicating policy changes in ways that can make or break audience acceptance. All of this is important to advance injury and violence prevention.
What advice do you have for injury and violence prevention students?
One of the biggest pieces of advice I’d offer, especially to undergraduate and MPH students who are newer to the field, is to use your time in school to engage in real-world injury and violence prevention projects.
Coursework and the research literature are valuable, but they can’t replace understanding the lived experience of the people affected by injuries and violence or the nuts and bolts of the folks who are working to prevent it. Getting involved in practice is going to help you understand your “why” so much better than reading an article or listening to a lecture, but it will also make you a better researcher too, if that is your goal.
Even if you discover that a specific area or issue isn’t the right fit for you, that’s still you learning and growing in the field! So, really my advice is get involved and go be a part of public health, don’t just study it.
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