Gary L Kreps


Gary L. Kreps is a communication scholar. He is a university distinguished professor of communication at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, United States, where he directs the Center for Health and Risk Communication . He served as chair of the Department of Communication from 2004 to 2013, and held the Eileen and Steve Mandell Endowed Chair in Health Communication from 2004 to 2010. He served on the governing board of the Center for Social Science Research, and has served as a long-time faculty affiliate of the National Center for Biodefense and Infectious Diseases, the Center for Health Care Ethics and Policy, the Center for International Medical Policies and Practices, the Center for Health Information Technology, the Center for Health Intervention Research, the Center for the Advancement of Wellbeing, and the Center for Climate Change Communication at Mason.
Prior to his faculty appointment at Mason, he served for five years as the founding chief of the Health Communication and Informatics Research Branch at the National Cancer Institute, where he planned, developed, and coordinated major new national research and outreach initiatives concerning risk communication, health promotion, behavior change, technology development, and information dissemination to promote effective cancer prevention, screening, control, care, and survivorship. During his tenure, the NCI planned and introduced the Health Information National Trends Survey and the Centers of Excellence in Cancer Communication Research. He continues to advise the NCI and several other federal agencies, foundations, research firms, health care delivery systems, and health product and service corporations.
He has also served as the founding dean of the School of Communication at Hofstra University in New York, executive director of the Greenspun School of Communication at UNLV, and in faculty and administrative roles at Northern Illinois, Rutgers, Indiana, and Purdue Universities. He is the founding co-director of the Global Advocacy Leadership Academy program to promote effective health advocacy organizations to champion the needs of health consumers and caregivers around the world. He also helps coordinate the Fairfax County Health Literacy Initiative community-based collaborative to support the health information needs of vulnerable and at-risk populations. He served as an advisory board member for the Sun Safety Alliance, PatientInform, Impatient Sciences Inc, and SmartPatients.
Kreps’ areas of expertise include health communication and promotion, information dissemination, organizational communication, information technology, multicultural relations, and applied research methods. He is an active scholar, whose published work includes more than 50 books and edited volumes, and more than 350 scholarly articles and chapters concerning the applications of communication knowledge in society.
He has received research funding from the NIH, National Science Foundation, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, HRSA, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the US Department of Education, the US Department of Defense, the Kaiser Family Foundation, and several universities, major corporations, and health care systems. Kreps has established international collaborations in Asia and Europe to extend the Health Information National Trends Survey research and intervention program around the globe, most notably with HINTS-China and HINTS-Germany. New international HINTS research partnerships are being planned for implementation.
He has edited special issues of major research journals, including the Journal of Health Communication, the American Behavioral Scientist, Patient Education and Counseling, the Journal of Health Psychology, the , the Journal of Cancer Education, Communication Education, the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Social Marketing Quarterly, and the Electronic Journal of Communication, and edits important scholarly book series in Health Communication and Communication and Social Organization for Hampton Press, and a book series in Health Communication for Peter Lang Publishers.
He has also received numerous honors, including the 2015 Research Laureate Award from the American Academy for Health Behavior, the 2014 Dale Brashers Mentorship Award from the National Communication Association, the 2014 Gary Gumpert Urban Communication Research Award from the Urban Communication Foundation, the 2014 Endeavour Executive Fellowship Award from the Australian Department of Education, the 2014 FIRST Scholar Award from the University of Colorado, the 2012-2013 Graduate Faculty Advisor Award from the GMU Communication Graduate Student Association, the 2010 Distinguished Communicator Award from the Virginia Academy of Communication Arts & Sciences, the 2010 NCA Distinguished Administrator Award, 2009 Centennial Health Communication Scholar Award from the Eastern Communication Association, the 2005–2006 Pfizer Visiting Professorship of Clear Health Communication Award, the 2004 Robert Lewis Donohew Outstanding Health Communication Scholar Award, the 2002 Future of Health Technology Award, the , the 2000 Outstanding Health Communication Scholar Award from both the International Communication Association and the National Communication Association, and the 1998 Gerald M. Phillips Distinguished Applied Communication Scholarship Award from the National Communication Association. He was elected as a fellow of the American Academy for Health Behavior in 2010.

Education

Kreps is a founding scholar of the field of health communication. He has written influential books and articles about the applications of communication knowledge in society. His work examined the development and implementation of evidence-based and culturally-sensitive health communication interventions to promote informed and collaborative health decisions by those who are confronting challenging health problems. He has been working on the development of adaptive and interactive health information systems using artificial intelligence to supplement and extend traditional channels for health communication.

Published works

Kreps has published numerous books, articles, and chapters concerning health, risk, and organizational communication, as well as about research methods. He edits two major book series for Hampton Press concerning health communication and communication and social organizing and a book series on health communication for Peter Lang Publishers. He was editor of the Applied Communication Research book series for the National Communication Association. He has served as a guest editor for a number of scholarly journal special issues, including special issues of the American Behavioral Scientist, the Journal of Health Psychology, the Electronic Journal of Communication, the Journal of Health Communication, Patient Education and Counseling, the , Communication Research Reports, Communication Education, the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Social Marketing Quarterly, and the Journal of Cancer Education.

Recent publications

http://www.aaai.org/ocs/index.php/SSS/SSS11/paper/viewFile/2475/2857
Gary L. Kreps has received numerous awards for his research and scholarships including: