Department at George Mason University, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA 22030, USA.
School of Medicine and Health Sciences, The George Washington University, Washington, DC 20052, USA.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2020 Sep 23;17(19):6969. doi: 10.3390/ijerph17196969.
Climate change is a global threat that poses significant risks to pregnant women and to their developing fetus and newborn. Educating pregnant women about the risks to their pregnancy may improve maternal and child health outcomes. Prior research suggests that presenting health information in narrative format can be more effective than a didactic format. Hence, the purpose of this study was to test the effectiveness of two brief educational interventions in a diverse group of pregnant women ( = 151). Specifically, using a post-test only randomized experiment, we compared the effectiveness of brief information presented in a narrative format versus a didactic format; both information formats were also compared to a no information control group. Outcome measures included pregnant women's actual and perceived knowledge, risk perception, affective assessment, self-efficacy, intention to take protective behaviors, and subsequent information seeking behavior. As hypothesized, for all outcome measures, the narrative format was more effective than the didactic format. These results suggest the benefits of a narrative approach (versus a didactic approach) to educating pregnant women about the maternal and child health threats posed by climate change. This study adds to a growing literature on the effectiveness of narrative-based approaches to health communication.
气候变化是一个全球性的威胁，对孕妇及其发育中的胎儿和新生儿构成重大风险。教育孕妇了解妊娠风险可能会改善母婴健康结果。先前的研究表明，以叙述性格式呈现健康信息可能比说教式格式更有效。因此，本研究旨在测试两种简短教育干预措施在不同孕妇群体（n = 151）中的有效性。具体来说，我们使用后测仅随机实验，比较了以叙述性格式呈现的简短信息与说教式格式的有效性；还将这两种信息格式与无信息对照组进行了比较。结果测量包括孕妇的实际和感知知识、风险感知、情感评估、自我效能、采取保护行为的意愿以及随后的信息寻求行为。正如假设的那样，对于所有结果测量，叙述性格式比说教式格式更有效。这些结果表明，采用叙述性方法（而非说教式方法）教育孕妇了解气候变化对母婴健康构成的威胁具有益处。这项研究增加了关于基于叙述的健康传播方法有效性的不断增长的文献。
