Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #109927

V. Sanders Thompson, MA, PhD¹, Nancy Weaver, MPH, PhD¹, Keri Jupka, MPH², Shanti Parikh, PhD³, Nikki Caito, MPH, MS, RD¹, Matthew W. Kreuter, PhD, MPH², and Patricia Cavzos, PhD⁴. (1) Health Communication Research Laboratory, Saint Louis University, 3545 Lafayette, Salus Center Room 414, St. Louis, MO 63104, 314-977-4044, sandersv@slu.edu, (2) Health Communication Research Laboratory, School of Public Health, Saint Louis University, 3545 Lafayette Avenue, St. Louis, MO 63104, (3) Anthropology, Washington University, McMillan Hall, St. Louis, MO 63130, (4) Center for Mental Health Research, WashingtonUniversity in St. Louis, One Brookings Drive, Campus Box 1093, St. Louis, MO 63130

Little is known about how to achieve cultural appropriateness in health communication. In an effort to develop a theory of cultural health communication, investigators have articulated three approaches to achieve cultural appropriateness. Peripheral approaches enhance effectiveness of health communication by using colors, pictures or titles that appeal to a particular group. Evidential approaches provide data specific to that group. Sociocultural approaches address health in the context of social and/or cultural characteristics of the intended audience. This "deep structure" approach to cultural sensitivity increases salience to the target population (Resnicow et al., 1999) by recognizing a group's values and behaviors, and reinforcing and building upon these to provide context and meaning to health information. While many aspects of culture may be relevant to health communication, very few of the identifiable cultural constructs have been explored. Fatalism, spirituality/religiosity, mistrust, collectivism, acculturation, and identity are most often studied. This presentation is based on a review of cultural variables studied in the health and social science literature, as well as results from 11 focus groups (N=47, African Americans over 40), and nine key informant interviews. This presentation will describe a process for identifying cultural constructs relevant for a particular health promotion effort. Those commonly studied and alternative sociocultural constructs, i.e. communalism, John Henryism; and insights gained from an effort to develop colorectal cancer risk reduction materials for African Americans are presented. Analyses suggest the need for nuance in understanding meanings of social and cultural constructs and recognition of within population variations in construct relevance.

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