Results From a National Survey of Health Communication Master's Degree Recipients: An Exploration of Training, Placement, Satisfaction, and Success

Abstract

The field of health communication has seen substantial growth in recent years, but existing health communication research literature contains little information on individuals who practice health communication in applied settings. This study reports the results of a national survey that targeted the alumni of 5 institutions that offer a master's degree in health communication. Of the 522 total graduates to whom the survey was sent, 398 responded. Survey results provided information in a number of areas including undergraduate education background; criteria used to determine what type of master's degree in health communication to pursue; strategies used to gain employment; employment sector of first job after graduation; salaries received after completion of a master's degree in health communication; satisfaction with career choice after completion of master's degree; satisfaction with type of master's degree in health communication received; satisfaction with career choice after completion of master's degree; and the degree to which respondents felt their master's program in health communication prepared them to meet core competencies in the field. These findings have significant implications for the health communication field and the programs that prepare individuals for a career as a health communication practitioner.

Notes

¹Identifying the exact starting point for health communication as a distinct field of study is a debatable proposition and depends on which of several criteria one applies (e.g., content of publications, sanctioned interest groups in professional organizations, courses offered at universities). See essays by Kreps, Bonaguro, and Query (1998) and Freimuth (2012) that have traced the genesis of the field in detail.

²All data presented in this report came from questions in which the respondents had a menu of answers from which to choose. The exception is the question in which respondents reported undergraduate majors. That was an open-ended question. Two of the authors coded the data for that question based on a simple category system.

³Five institutions participated in the present study, but throughout the Method, Results, and Discussion sections, we refer to six programs because the Tufts University School of Medicine offers both the MS degree and the MPH with a concentration in health communication.