247367 Who are you going to believe?

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Adrienne Keller, PhD , Department of Student Health, National Social Norms Institute at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA
Believability is a perennial issue in health promotion. Multiyear data (2000-2009) from 26,642 students (66% female; 72% Caucasian) in nine universities administering the American College Health Association's National College Health Assessment (ACHA-NCHA) is used to investigate patterns of believability. Respondents rate the believability of health information from thirteen sources. Using a combination of believability/unbelievability percents, factor analysis with a Varimax rotation and multidimensional scaling, four categories are identifiable. The very high believability category includes medical staff and health educators. The high believability category includes parents, faculty and leaflets/pamplets/flyers. The moderate believability category includes the campus newspaper, peer educators and Resident Advisors. The lowest believability category includes friends, internet, magazines and religious centers. TV is in a category by itself as more unbelievable than believable. In a multinomial logistic regression, after controlling for demographic differences across the years, the only significant changes in believability were a 12% decrease in the believability of religious centers (X2=90.23, df=1, p<.001), 5% decreases in the believability of TV (X2=11.81, df=1, p=.001) and magazines (X2=14.43, df=1, p<.001) and a 15% increase in the believability of the internet (X2=96.83, df=1, p<.001). The good news is that health educators have the same high believability as medical staff. The concerning news is the moderate believability of peer educators and Resident Advisors and the increasing believability of the internet. This presentation will include audience discussion of the implications of these findings for health promotion on college campuses.

Learning Areas:
Administration, management, leadership
Communication and informatics
Conduct evaluation related to programs, research, and other areas of practice
Implementation of health education strategies, interventions and programs
Planning of health education strategies, interventions, and programs
Program planning

Learning Objectives:
At the end of the presentation, participants will be able to: 1. Rank the top five most believable sources of information for college students 2. Differentiate the believability of professional health educators and peer educators 3. Discuss the implications of changes in believability across the years for health promotion and education on college campuses.

Keywords: Health Promotion, College Students

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I personally conducted the analyses which are the basis for this presentation. As Research Director of the National Social Norms Institute I am responsible for the integrity of the ACHA-NCHA data from each school.
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.