Online Program

290045
A study on constructing Taiwan children's health literacy ability from health promotion view


Monday, November 4, 2013

Chieh-Hsing Liu, Department of Health Promotion and Health Education, National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei 106, Taiwan
Tzu-Chau Chang, Graduate Institute of Environmental Education, National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei 116, Taiwan
Liling Liao, Department of Health Management, I-Shou University, Kaohsiung City, Taiwan
Chi-Chia Cheng, Department of Public Health, Fu-jen Catholic University, New Taipei City 24205, Taiwan
Hsueh -Yun Chi, Department of Health Developing and Marketing, Kainan University, Taoyuan, Taiwan
Yu-Shan Lee, Department of Health Promotion and Health Education, National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei 106, Taiwan
Health literacy has been proven related to health inequality, poor health behavior, and health status. Current health literacy is measured mostly on adults based on a medical view internationally; it is imperative to understand children's health life experience and situation in which they live, thus this study attempts to construct elementary school 6th graders' health literacy ability in Taiwan. This study proceeded in 3 stages. In Stage I, in-depth interviews were conducted with 10 teachers and 11 parents, and focus group interviews with 30 children, in order to understand the situations and difficulties related to children's health. Stage II identified the literacy corresponding to every real-life situation from life skills proposed by the WHO and the Taiwanese grade 1-9 Curriculum Guidelines for health education. Stage III redefined children health literacy from a health promotion perspective through expert meeting and confirmed indicators by 2 Delphi surveys with 21 health education researchers, experts and teachers. This study constructed 25 “children health literacy ability indicators”, including: 11 Functional Health Literacy (e.g. understands the connection between personal health care behavior and health), 7 Interactive Health Literacy (e.g. obtains and understands information from various channels), and 7 Critical Health Literacy (e.g. analyzes the relationship between personal needs and diet choice for a balanced diet). These indicators cover 10 health education categories. Based on WHO's health promotion perspective, this study proposed an operational definition of 3 aspects of health literacy to serve as an importance basis for development of Taiwan children health literacy scale.

Learning Areas:

Advocacy for health and health education
Public health or related education

Learning Objectives:
Define children health literacy content Formulate children’s health literacy indicator

Keyword(s): Children, Health Literacy

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have been the principal of National Science Council funded grants focusing on the health literacy. Among my scientific interests has been the development of strategies for improving children's health through school health education.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.