Keynote Speaker

David Ropeik
David Ropeik is an author, consultant, and speaker on risk perception and risk communication. His book, How Risky Is It, Really? Why Our Fears Don’t Always Match
the Facts was published in 2010, and he co-authored RISK, A Practical Guide for Deciding What’s Dangerous and What’s Safe in the World Around You in 2002 with George Gray. Mr. Ropeik has advised and presented to a broad range of governmental agencies, businesses, trade associations, health care organizations, consumer groups, and educational institutions worldwide including organizations as diverse as the US Department of Homeland Security, The World Bank, The American Meat Institute and the US Public Affairs Council.

Mr. Ropeik currently writes the “Risk: Reason and Reality” blog at BigThink.com, the “How Risky Is It Really?” blog at Psychology Today, and is a contributing blogger at Huffington Post, Scientific American, Columbia Journalism Review, Climate Central, Dot Earth, and the New York Times Room for Debate. His Op-Eds and articles on risk, risk perception and risk communication have appeared in numerous publications including The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Atlantic Magazine (online), NPR (online), Parade Magazine, The Washington Post, USA Today, The Boston Globe, Newsday, Health Affairs, and the Congressional Quarterly. He has been interviewed on risk perception by ABC Nightline, National Public Radio, NBC Dateline, ABC 20/20, Fox News, and CNN.

Mr. Ropeik was a television news reporter in Boston for 22 years, specializing in coverage of environmental and science issues. He has created and directs a training program for journalists for improving media coverage of risk and teaches courses on this subject at the Harvard School of Public Health, the Kennedy School of Government, the Neiman Fellowship Program at Harvard, the Knight Science
Journalism Fellowship program at MIT, Boston University’s Program in Science Journalism, the Emerson College program in Health Communication, and to the National Association of Science Writers, the Council for the Advancement of Science Writers, and the Society of Environmental Journalists.

Mr. Ropeik holds Bachelor and Masters Degrees in Journalism from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. He was a Knight Science Journalism Fellow at MIT, a National Tropical Botanical Garden Fellow and a member of the board of directors of the Society of
Environmental Journalists.

Keynote Speaker

Brian Zikmund-Fisher, PhD
Brian J. Zikmund-Fisher, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, University of Michigan School of Public Health and a Research Assistant Professor in the UM
Department of Internal Medicine. In addition, he is a faculty member of the UM Center for Bioethics and Social Sciences in Medicine, the UM Risk Science Center, and the UM Health Informatics Program. Dr. Zikmund-Fisher received his PhD in Behavioral Decision Theory (a combination of decision psychology and behavioral economics) from Carnegie Mellon University and completed a post-doctoral fellowship in medical decision making at the Ann Arbor VA Medical Center. He uses this interdisciplinary background to study factors that affect individual decision making about a variety of health and medical issues, with a particular emphasis on risk communication and numeracy (people's ability to use numbers to inform their decisions). He teaches graduate courses in risk communication and designing memorable health messages.

Dr. Zikmund-Fisher co-directed the recently completed National Survey of Medical Decisions (often referred to as the DECISIONS Study) that surveyed over 3000 adults about common medical decisions, such as decisions to initiate cholesterol medications, get a mammogram, or have lower back surgery. He also serves as an Associate Editor of the journal Medical Decision Making and guest edited the special issue of that journal that focused exclusively on results from the DECISIONS study.

Dr. Zikmund-Fisher is the Principal Investigator of the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences funded Community Perceptions of Dioxins Study that is using a mental models approach to understand the risk perceptions and risk-related knowledge of residents of a community with known dioxin contamination. Dr. Zikmund-Fisher also serves as PI on awards from the American Cancer Society and the
Foundation for Informed Medical Decision Making regarding the development and testing of visual displays to help patients visualize and use risk information in decision making about cancer treatments and elective surgeries.

Panel Moderator

Chisara N. Asomugha, MD, MSPH, FAAP
Chisara N. Asomugha, MD, MSPH, FAAP is the Community Services Administrator for the City of New Haven. In this capacity, Dr. Asomugha oversees the operations of the Health, Youth and Elderly Services Departments, as well as social services policy and programs in New Haven. Prior to her role in New Haven government, she was a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholar at Yale University where she conducted community-
based participatory research on the root causes of youth gun violence in New Haven.

A board certified pediatrician and ordained minister, she has worked with faith-based, civic, criminal justice, community and medical organizations in the US and overseas to implement evidence-based policy and programs in urban environments. She gives lectures nationwide and has written for the Washington Post online on health care reform. In 2009 Dr. Asomugha was named a National Finalist for the White House Fellows Program. A graduate of Stanford University and the Duke University School of Medicine, she currently serves as
Vice President of Operations for the Asomugha Foundation, Inc., an international non-profit that promotes educational opportunities for youth in the US and Africa.