I was listening to NPR: Science Friday last week and heard an interview with one of the authors of an interesting study on hand washing, "Experimental Pretesting of Hand-Washing Interventions in a Natural Setting." The abstract is online here from the American Journal of Public Health.
This caught my attention, as I'm hoping to develop a new hand washing campaign this spring. I had some graduate students tackle hand washing with the University of Texas campus health promotion folks, and they came up with some interesting ideas. The students approached the problem from a lot of different directions, some of which seem like they might have real potential. Some of their suggestions were relatively different from how a public health-oriented researcher/practitioner might approach the problem, which is why I love pairing advertising graduate students with public health "clients" for class projects.
I'll post a bit more once I know if this is really happening and how the project is likely to evolve, but for now I just wanted to share the study - good stuff.
Judah G, Aunger R, Schmidt WP, Michie S, Granger S, Curtis V. (2009) Experimental pretesting of hand-washing interventions in a natural setting. Am J Public Health. Oct;99 Suppl 2:S405-11.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Monday, October 26, 2009
"Gendered" Health Conditions
As I've mentioned here before, I have a freshmen seminar on health communication and the media. It's a class that I enjoy teaching, as it ranges from health communication/behavior theories to applications of those theories as we consider health in the media.
A week or two ago we were talking about gender in health. I wanted to try something new that day, so I came up with a list of health conditions some of which were relatively obviously gendered (e.g., breast cancer) and others which might not be quite so obvious (e.g., alcoholism). Each student team quickly arranged the conditions into "male" and "female" illnesses, and then we compared notes.
What was surprising was how many of the illnesses were unanimously declared male or female conditions. Alcoholism, for example, was definitely considered male. When asked where this idea comes from, the discussion turned to the media - the dad from Grey's Anatomy, alcoholic husbands/boyfriends from movies, etc. In the classroom, it was a challenge to think of a prominent alcoholic female character.
That isn't to say such characters don't exist, of course. That very night I watched the most recent episode of Law and Order: SVU, in which the alcoholic male killer was being prosecuted by an alcoholic female district attorney. But it was interesting to see how everyone's perceptions of a lot of these conditions were driven by TV dramas and media coverage.
My own research doesn't necessarily focus on gender, and this isn't something I'd pursue in the near future... But it certainly seems like there could be some cool projects in this area.
A week or two ago we were talking about gender in health. I wanted to try something new that day, so I came up with a list of health conditions some of which were relatively obviously gendered (e.g., breast cancer) and others which might not be quite so obvious (e.g., alcoholism). Each student team quickly arranged the conditions into "male" and "female" illnesses, and then we compared notes.
What was surprising was how many of the illnesses were unanimously declared male or female conditions. Alcoholism, for example, was definitely considered male. When asked where this idea comes from, the discussion turned to the media - the dad from Grey's Anatomy, alcoholic husbands/boyfriends from movies, etc. In the classroom, it was a challenge to think of a prominent alcoholic female character.
That isn't to say such characters don't exist, of course. That very night I watched the most recent episode of Law and Order: SVU, in which the alcoholic male killer was being prosecuted by an alcoholic female district attorney. But it was interesting to see how everyone's perceptions of a lot of these conditions were driven by TV dramas and media coverage.
My own research doesn't necessarily focus on gender, and this isn't something I'd pursue in the near future... But it certainly seems like there could be some cool projects in this area.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
A Systematic Review of Literature About the Genetic Testing of Adolescents
I wanted to share a new article I co-authored with Lynn Rew and Daniel Bonevac which just came out in the most recent issue of the Journal for Specialists in Pediatric Nursing. The abstract is:
Rew, L., Mackert, M., & Bonevac, D. (2009) A Systematic Review of Literature About the Genetic Testing of Adolescents. Journal for Specialists in Pediatric Nursing, 14 (4), 284-294.
PURPOSE. Mapping of the human genome raises interest in and concern about the genetic testing of adolescents. Our purpose was to determine the attitudes and knowledge adolescents and their parents have about genetic testing.This was a really interesting project to work on, and I'm hopeful it's going to lead to continued work related to the genetic testing of adolescents - what parents and adolescents know, some of the ethical implications involved, etc. For those interested in more about this particular article, here's the abstract at JSPN and PubMed listing.
DESIGN AND METHOD. This paper is a report of a systematic review of the research literature (n = 56) about the attitudes and knowledge adolescents and their parents have about genetic testing.
RESULTS. The majority of studies, which were descriptive in design, focused on a specific heritable disorder, were conducted in the United States, and over sampled well-educated White females.
PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS. Results suggest that adolescents and their families have relatively positive attitudes about genetic testing and may experience both harms and benefits from testing. Nurses may be in positions to assist adolescents and their families in making decisions about genetic testing, remaining sensitive to family dynamics and issues of privacy and autonomy.
Rew, L., Mackert, M., & Bonevac, D. (2009) A Systematic Review of Literature About the Genetic Testing of Adolescents. Journal for Specialists in Pediatric Nursing, 14 (4), 284-294.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Hamburger Safety
I've been pretty busy lately for the last couple weeks as I'm supervising a dissertation, so interesting topics to post here have been piling up. Before calling it a night I wanted to get at least one item off my list...
Last Wednesday On Point had a show about hamburger safety (show summary), which grew from the New York Times article (here) about a young woman that ate a hamburger and then ended up in a coma and paralyzed. There are some pretty amazing details which I know I wasn't familiar with, so if nothing else it's a pretty educational 45 minutes.
What I found to be really interesting, though, were the first couple callers who used this story as proof that they made the right decision to be vegetarians. I was hoping that the host might point out recent scares related to peanut butter and other non-meat products, which he did. But that didn't necessarily make a difference to those callers - it definitely didn't jive with their point in calling in the first place.
I wish I had the time/capacity to tackle something related to this right now, because I think it's a really neat context for a study - particularly when some people are firm believers in the benefit of particular diets (vegetarian, high protein, whatever) and stories like this can present some very unwelcome facts that challenge those beliefs.
Last Wednesday On Point had a show about hamburger safety (show summary), which grew from the New York Times article (here) about a young woman that ate a hamburger and then ended up in a coma and paralyzed. There are some pretty amazing details which I know I wasn't familiar with, so if nothing else it's a pretty educational 45 minutes.
What I found to be really interesting, though, were the first couple callers who used this story as proof that they made the right decision to be vegetarians. I was hoping that the host might point out recent scares related to peanut butter and other non-meat products, which he did. But that didn't necessarily make a difference to those callers - it definitely didn't jive with their point in calling in the first place.
I wish I had the time/capacity to tackle something related to this right now, because I think it's a really neat context for a study - particularly when some people are firm believers in the benefit of particular diets (vegetarian, high protein, whatever) and stories like this can present some very unwelcome facts that challenge those beliefs.
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Health Infonomics: Intelligent Applications of Information Technology
I just received an e-mail message from IGI Global that a book I have a chapter in will be released later this month. The book is Infonomics for Distributed Business and Decision-making Environments: Creating Information System Ecology, and the chapter I co-authored is "Health Infonomics: Intelligent Applications of Information Technology." If you're interested in learning more about the book or pre-ordering, you might want to check out Amazon or the information page at IGI Global.
I'd post the abstract for my chapter here, but I'm not sure if I'm supposed to... So I'll go with just the description as released by IGI Global:
I'd post the abstract for my chapter here, but I'm not sure if I'm supposed to... So I'll go with just the description as released by IGI Global:
The information economy continues to challenge businesses in many ways with information technologies and globalization leading to blurred the organizational boundaries.
Infonomics for Distributed Business and Decision-Making Environments: Creating Information System Ecology provides greater understanding of issues, challenges, trends, and technologies effecting the overall utilization and management of information in modern organizations around the world. A leading field resource, this innovative collection addresses the emerging issues in information resources economics and its applications.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Collective Efficacy
I have read a few articles in the last week or so about collective efficacy, and I wanted to highlight one that I found to be particularly useful:
The authors investigated the role of collective efficacy among couples seeking to adhere to an exercise program in managing Type 2 diabetes and arrived at three main themes: collective support, collective motivation, and collective responsibility.
There are a few reasons that I enjoyed this particular project’s take on collective efficacy, though the biggest is probably that it seems to be relatively unique in using collective efficacy to study a group’s ability to achieve some goal that isn’t technically its core reason for existing; a lot of what I’ve read, including some of Bandura’s writing on the subject, talks about collective efficacy in terms of a football team or some other group that exists to mean a stated goal (e.g., winning the game) and then discusses collective efficacy as that teams efficacy in reaching that goal.
To me, the Beverly and Wray article represents an important direction to go with collective efficacy, only because a lot of groups (or at least many members within a particular group) might want to achieve goals that aren’t related to the group’s real reason for existing. Employee-sponsored wellness programs would be one major example I can think of. And collective efficacy probably shouldn’t be considered “just” social support – there is a big difference between having plenty of positive social support (say in a group wellness program) and believing that the group as a whole has the ability to reach its goals – whatever specific health goals those might be.
Measuring collective efficacy is a whole other can of worms, so perhaps that will be a future post… In this case I just wanted to point to the Beverly and Wray article, because it was a pretty unique take on collective efficacy and worth a read.
Beverly, E., & Wray, L. (2008). The role of collective efficacy in exercise adherence: a qualitative study of spousal support and Type 2 diabetes management. Health Education Research.The abstract is up on PubMed at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18559399
The authors investigated the role of collective efficacy among couples seeking to adhere to an exercise program in managing Type 2 diabetes and arrived at three main themes: collective support, collective motivation, and collective responsibility.
There are a few reasons that I enjoyed this particular project’s take on collective efficacy, though the biggest is probably that it seems to be relatively unique in using collective efficacy to study a group’s ability to achieve some goal that isn’t technically its core reason for existing; a lot of what I’ve read, including some of Bandura’s writing on the subject, talks about collective efficacy in terms of a football team or some other group that exists to mean a stated goal (e.g., winning the game) and then discusses collective efficacy as that teams efficacy in reaching that goal.
To me, the Beverly and Wray article represents an important direction to go with collective efficacy, only because a lot of groups (or at least many members within a particular group) might want to achieve goals that aren’t related to the group’s real reason for existing. Employee-sponsored wellness programs would be one major example I can think of. And collective efficacy probably shouldn’t be considered “just” social support – there is a big difference between having plenty of positive social support (say in a group wellness program) and believing that the group as a whole has the ability to reach its goals – whatever specific health goals those might be.
Measuring collective efficacy is a whole other can of worms, so perhaps that will be a future post… In this case I just wanted to point to the Beverly and Wray article, because it was a pretty unique take on collective efficacy and worth a read.
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