Gagné Thierry, Ghenadenik Adrian E, Abel Thomas, Frohlich Katherine L
Institut de recherche en santé publique de l'Université de Montréal (IRSPUM), Canada.
Centre de recherche du Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal (CRCHUM), Canada.
Health Promot Int. 2018 Jun 1;33(3):390-399. doi: 10.1093/heapro/daw094.
Over their lifecourse, young adults develop different skills and preferences in relationship to the information sources they seek when having questions about health. Health information seeking behaviour (HISB) includes multiple, unequally accessed sources; yet most studies have focused on single sources and did not examine HISB's association with social inequalities. This study explores 'multiple-source' profiles and their association with socioeconomic characteristics. We analyzed cross-sectional data from the Interdisciplinary Study of Inequalities in Smoking involving 2093 young adults recruited in Montreal, Canada, in 2011-2012. We used latent class analysis to create profiles based on responses to questions regarding whether participants sought health professionals, family, friends or the Internet when having questions about health. Using multinomial logistic regression, we examined the associations between profiles and economic, social and cultural capital indicators: financial difficulties and transportation means, friend satisfaction and network size, and individual, mother's, and father's education. Five profiles were found: 'all sources' (42%), 'health professional centred' (29%), 'family only' (14%), 'Internet centred' (14%) and 'no sources' (2%). Participants with a larger social network and higher friend satisfaction were more likely to be in the 'all sources' group. Participants who experienced financial difficulties and completed college/university were less likely to be in the 'family only' group; those whose mother had completed college/university were more likely to be in this group. Our findings point to the importance of considering multiple sources to study HISB, especially when the capacity to seek multiple sources is unequally distributed. Scholars should acknowledge HISB's implications for health inequalities.
在整个生命历程中，年轻人在遇到健康问题时，会针对他们所寻求的信息来源发展出不同的技能和偏好。健康信息寻求行为（HISB）包括多个获取途径不平等的信息来源；然而，大多数研究都集中在单一来源上，并未考察HISB与社会不平等之间的关联。本研究探讨“多源”模式及其与社会经济特征的关联。我们分析了2011 - 2012年在加拿大蒙特利尔招募的2093名年轻人参与的吸烟不平等跨学科研究中的横断面数据。我们使用潜在类别分析，根据参与者在遇到健康问题时是否寻求健康专业人员、家人、朋友或互联网的问题回答来创建模式。使用多项逻辑回归，我们考察了这些模式与经济、社会和文化资本指标之间的关联：经济困难和交通方式、朋友满意度和社交网络规模，以及个人、母亲和父亲的教育程度。我们发现了五种模式：“所有来源”（42%）、“以健康专业人员为中心”（29%）、“仅家人”（14%）、“以互联网为中心”（14%）和“无来源”（2%）。社交网络较大且朋友满意度较高的参与者更有可能属于“所有来源”组。经历经济困难且完成大学学业的参与者不太可能属于“仅家人”组；母亲完成大学学业的参与者更有可能属于该组。我们的研究结果表明，在研究HISB时考虑多个来源很重要，尤其是当寻求多个来源的能力分布不均时。学者们应该认识到HISB对健康不平等的影响。
