Comparison of rural and urban residents' implicit and explicit attitudes related to seeking medical care.

CONTEXT

The decision whether or not to consult a physician draws from a variety of attitudes within an individual's health schema. While rural Americans are in greater need of health care, many of them have fewer external resources than urbanites available to them.

PURPOSE

The objective of this study was to elicit implicit and explicit attitudes related to seeking medical treatment for a condition described as fairly serious. Participants were asked to rate how often they comply with treatment regimens and practice good health habits.

METHODS

The sample of rural (N = 586) and urban (N = 433) North Carolina residents was derived based on random-digit dialing. Multiple regression analyses were performed to investigate how attitudes associated with perceived compliance and health behaviors.

FINDINGS

While rural and urban residents offered very similar responses, the associations between attitudes and behaviors were different. One healthy and 2 unhealthy schema patterns emerged. First, fear of hospitals was associated with effective compliance for rural residents and good health habits for urbanites. Second, affordability concerns were ascribed to rural community residents but seemed to reflect personally relevant implicit attitudes since they were associated with poor health adherence and habits for rural residents. Third, mistrust of doctors predicted low adherence for both groups and was also associated with poorer health habits for urbanites. With inconsistencies among implicit and explicit attitudes and behaviors, some residents seemed to be ambivalent about seeking health care.