Health Literacy and Health Behavior in Late School-age Children

Jang, Byeong Soon; Kim, Dong Hee

Abstract

PURPOSE
This study was conducted to analyze the association between health literacy and health behavior and the effect of health literacy on health behavior in late school-age children.
METHODS
Data were obtained from 333 participants who were 5th and 6th-grade students sampled from 8 elementary schools in Busan. Rapid Estimate of Adolescent Literacy in Medicine (REALM-Teen) and Newest Vital Sign (NVS) was used for assessing linguistic and functional health literacy, and the health promotion behavior score was measured for health behavior.
RESULTS
The percentage of those with limited linguistic and functional health literacy was high (47.1%, 56.8%). Linguistic health literacy (r=.38, p<.001) and functional health literacy (r=.11, p=.048) had a correlation with health behavior. Health behavior was significantly associated with perceived health status (beta=1.94, p<.001), number of times of health education (beta=0.18, p<.001), academic achievement (p<.001), home literacy environment (beta=0.13, p=.016), perception of changes after health education (p=.011), and linguistic health literacy (beta=0.23, p<.001).
CONCLUSION
The results of this study indicate that children with adequate health literacy are more likely to do health behaviors. Therefore, it is important to develop educational strategies to raise children's health literacy level and consequently to induce them to perform more health behaviors in daily life.