Children forgotten in hot cars: a mental models approach for improving public health messaging

2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 279-287 ◽  
Author(s):  
Castle A Williams ◽  
Andrew J Grundstein
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Mental Models ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Health Campaigns ◽  
News Reports ◽  
Knowledge And Beliefs ◽  
The Usa ◽  
Public Health Campaigns ◽  
Building Rapport ◽  
Health Messaging

IntroductionOn average, in the USA, 37 young children die every year due to vehicular heatstroke. Additionally, over half of these incidents occur when a parent/caregiver forgets a child in a vehicle. While various governmental and child safety advocacy groups have worked to raise awareness about these tragedies, rigorous studies have yet to be conducted that examine the current understanding and effectiveness of this public health messaging.MethodsThis study will employ a mental models approach in order to identify differences that exist between experts’ and parents’/caregivers’ knowledge and beliefs surrounding the topic of children forgotten in hot cars. We interviewed a diverse set of 25 parents/caregivers and seven experts in order to construct and explore these mental models.ResultsA comparative analysis was conducted, and three key differences were observed between these mental models. Unlike the experts, the parents/caregivers in the study emphasised perceived lifestyle factors (eg, low-income parent) as important elements in increasing an individual’s likelihood of forgetting a child in a car. Importantly, the parents/caregivers primarily obtained information from news reports, while experts believed public health campaigns would reach more parents/caregivers. Lastly, while experts stressed that this tragedy could happen to anyone, most parents/caregivers failed to acknowledge that they could forget their own child in a car.ConclusionsTo confront this denial, future public health messaging must strive to engage and reach all parents/caregivers. This can be accomplished using a multifaceted messaging strategy that includes personalising core messaging, providing additional resources to media outlets and building rapport between key partners.

scholarly journals A cross-sectional population survey of physicians in Alberta, Canada about a novel provincial contact tracing smartphone app

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
D Jerome ◽  
M Pietrosanu ◽  
K Dhillon
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
English Language ◽  
Contact Tracing ◽  
Smartphone App ◽  
Health Campaigns ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Knowledge And Beliefs ◽  
Public Health Officials ◽  
Health Zone ◽  
Public Health Campaigns

Abstract Background The Canadian province of Alberta released the ABTraceTogether smartphone app in May 2020 to assist in contact tracing during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Public engagement with this public health tool has been low, limiting the effectiveness of the intervention. This study examines physician knowledge of the app and practice patterns in relation to the app. Methods We conducted a cross-sectional self-administered online English language survey of physicians and medical students in Alberta, Canada. The survey link was sent to all registered members of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta and was distributed by other provincial physician organizations and health zone leaders. Results The survey received 317 responses. 96% of participants were aware of the app but only 27% had recommended the app to patients. The most common reason provided for not downloading or recommending the app was that participants had security concerns about the app. 23% of participants indicated they did not believe they had a responsibility to recommend the app to others. Conclusions Our study provides insights into participants’ knowledge and beliefs about the ABTraceTogether app. This information may be valuable to public health officials who wish to engage physicians in future public health campaigns.

Demographic patterns of lockdown breakers: a worldwide study

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barnabas Szaszi ◽  
Balazs Aczel ◽  
Nandor Hajdu ◽  
Peter Szecsi ◽  
Elizabeth Tipton
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Health Campaigns ◽  
Target Populations ◽  
Country Level ◽  
Behavior Change Interventions ◽  
Education Levels ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Public Health Campaigns ◽  
Demographic Patterns

Knowing who to target with certain messages is the prerequisite of efficient public health campaigns during pandemics. Using the COVID-19 pandemic situation, we explored which facets of the society - defined by age, gender, income, and education levels - are the most likely to visit social gatherings and aggravate the spread of a disease. Analyzing the reported behavior of 87,169 individuals from and 41 countries, we found that in the majority of the countries, the proportion of social gathering-goers was higher in male than female, younger than older, lower-educated than higher educated, and low-income than high-income subgroups of the populations. However, the data showed noteworthy heterogeneity between the countries warranting against generalizing from one country to another. The analysis also revealed that relative to other demographic factors, income was the strongest predictor of avoidance of social gatherings followed by age, education and gender. Although the observed strength of these associations were relatively small, we argue that incorporating demographic-based segmentation into public health campaigns can increase the efficiency of campaigns with an important caveat: the exploration of these associations need to be done on a country level before using the information to target populations in behavior change interventions.

scholarly journals A machine learning analysis of the relationship of demographics and social gathering attendance from 41 countries during pandemic

2022 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Barnabas Szaszi ◽  
Nandor Hajdu ◽  
Peter Szecsi ◽  
Elizabeth Tipton ◽  
Balazs Aczel
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Health Campaigns ◽  
Country Level ◽  
Behavior Change Interventions ◽  
Education Levels ◽  
Social Gathering ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Public Health Campaigns ◽  
Relationship Of

AbstractKnowing who to target with certain messages is the prerequisite of efficient public health campaigns during pandemics. Using the COVID-19 pandemic situation, we explored which facets of the society—defined by age, gender, income, and education levels—are the most likely to visit social gatherings and aggravate the spread of a disease. Analyzing the reported behavior of 87,169 individuals from 41 countries, we found that in the majority of the countries, the proportion of social gathering-goers was higher in male than female, younger than older, lower-educated than higher educated, and low-income than high-income subgroups of the populations. However, the data showed noteworthy heterogeneity between the countries warranting against generalizing from one country to another. The analysis also revealed that relative to other demographic factors, income was the strongest predictor of avoidance of social gatherings followed by age, education, and gender. Although the observed strength of these associations was relatively small, we argue that incorporating demographic-based segmentation into public health campaigns can increase the efficiency of campaigns with an important caveat: the exploration of these associations needs to be done on a country level before using the information to target populations in behavior change interventions.

scholarly journals Trustworthiness of Doctors from Public Health Campaigns

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jens Koed Madsen
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Message Content ◽  
Health Campaigns ◽  
Four Dimensions ◽  
Exploratory Factor Analyses ◽  
Ethical Stance ◽  
Public Health Campaigns ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Meta Analyses ◽  
The Impact

Previous research concerning the effectiveness of public health campaigns have explored the impact of message design, message content, communication channel choice and other aspects of such campaigns. Meta analyses reported in the literature reveal, however, that the choice of endorsers in health campaigns remains unexplored. The present study addresses this gap in the literature by studying what makes doctors from public health campaigns appear trustworthy in the eyes of the receiver. The present research examines propensity for trust as well facets of trustworthiness of such expert doctors based on a survey carried out in the UK (155 respondents). Underlying factors of trustworthiness are explored to gain more insight into the understanding of how trust may affect the public’s belief updating and the formation of intentions. Exploratory factor analyses suggest four dimensions of trustworthiness. Multiple regression analyses demonstrate that these factors explain almost 70% of the variance in the participants’ expressed trust in doctors from public health campaigns. Doctors’ ethical stance and their care for the health of the general population appear to be more important for perceived trustworthiness than their actual professional background, although their abilities and competences are closely related to ethics and benevolence. For policy makers this has important implications when selecting endorsers for public health campaigns in order to design effective health related communication, for example to combat obesity.

scholarly journals Prevalence of Tobacco Use and Efforts for Tobacco Control in The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heeje Lee ◽  
Minah Kang ◽  
Sangchul Yoon ◽  
Kee B. Park
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Tobacco Control ◽  
Tobacco Use ◽  
Republic Of Korea ◽  
World Health ◽  
Online Media ◽  
Health Campaigns ◽  
Media Content Analysis ◽  
Public Health Campaigns ◽  
Health Organization

Abstract Tobacco use is one of the main public health concerns as it causes multiple diseases. The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) is one of the 168 signatory countries of the World Health Organization (WHO) member states agreed to adopt the WHO Framework Convention of Tobacco Control (FCTC). However, there is lack of information regarding the tobacco use in the DPRK and the government’s efforts for tobacco control. The aim of the study was to find the prevalence of tobacco use among the DPRK people and the government’s efforts to control tobacco use among its population, through literature review combined with online media content analysis. In 2020, the prevalence of tobacco smoking in males of 15 years and older was 46.1%, whereas that in females was zero. The online media contents showed the DPRK government’s stewardship to promote population health by controlling tobacco use. Furthermore, the DPRK government has taken steps to implement the mandates of the FCTC including introduction of new laws, promotion of research, development of cessation aids, as well as public health campaigns.

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