Environmental Health Literacy, an evolving field whose time has come

The field of environmental health literacy (EHL) has been emerging since the early 1990s. EHL bridges shared concepts from the fields of environmental health science, risk communication, behavioral science, evaluation, communications, public health, and social sciences. These fields are relevant to the mission and strategic goals of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS).

NIEHS maintains a long history of and strong commitment to communicating with the public about environmental health issues. In 1993, the NIEHS released its first funding announcement centered on ensuring that communities are aware of basic environmental health concepts, issues, and resources. Subsequent grant programs, including the Partnerships for Environmental Public Health Program, focused on engaging with, and addressing, environmental health concerns of community residents and the related concerns about environmental justice and environmental health disparities. These programs have shared a common goal -- to build the understanding of the connection between environmental exposures and health, which we now define as environmental health literacy. Outcomes from these programs have contributed to the institute’s recognition of and support for the emerging field of EHL, as well as the need to advance the scientific rigor of environmental health communication efforts.

This presentation will briefly outline the evolution of EHL and discuss NIEHS interest in moving the field of EHL forward. The presenter will describe a model of EHL and explain its relevance to environmental health sciences and environmental justice. The presentation will emphasize the need for EHL to go beyond the production of new educational materials and health risk messages to projects that explore the effectiveness of existing resources, through formal and rigorous assessment and validation, and whether information on risk leads to behavior change.