Parents Push Back: Health Promotion in a Web 2.0 World

Two key maternal-child health promotion messages are the supine position to reduce the risk of SIDS and not bed-sharing to prevent suffocation deaths. Parents' adherence to these messages is a challenge for health educators, particularly with access to potentially conflicting sources of information from Web 2.0 sources like social media sites. This paper examines factors that influence parents' adherence to infant sleep recommendations. Methods: A self-administered internet-accessed survey among national sample of adults with children <12 years (n=312). In multivariate analysis, factors associated with increased probability of adherence to messages were examined. Results: Parents who are knowledgeable about recommendations for infant sleep position and bed sharing are not necessarily likely to adhere to them. Parents who: believe supine position can help prevent SIDS are almost three times more likely to adhere to the recommendation than those who do not believe or are unsure that it can prevent SIDS (OR 2.92, CI 1.80-4.79) and parents that feel that the risk of suffocation due to bed-sharing is small are more likely to bed-share (OR 0.29, CI 0.17-0.50). Parents are also skeptical of some of the information that they are presented with. Discussion: Adherence to health messages is not just based on knowledge but parents' interpretation of risks and their belief in the efficacy of the recommendation. Health educators should acknowledge parents' attitudes about risks and how they negotiate health recommendations for infant sleep. Access to health information in a Web 2.0 world is changing the context of messaging to parents.