Have the Focus and Sophistication of Research in Health Education Changed?

Department of Health Science, College of Health and Human Performance, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah.

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: Ray_Merrill{at}byu.edu..

	Abstract

This study assessed the types of research and the statistical methods used in three representative health education journals from 1994 through 2003. Editorials, commentaries, program/practice notes, and perspectives represent 17.6% of the journals' content. The most common types of articles are cross-sectional studies (27.5%), reviews (23.2%), and analytic studies (i.e., case-control, cohort, and experimental studies) (18.4%). The estimated annual percentage change across the study period in these types of articles was 3.3, -9.3, and 5.5, respectively. A significant increase was observed in use of descriptive statistics (estimated annual percentage change = 2.4), parametric test statistics (4.4), nonparametric test statistics (3.5), epidemiologic statistics (10.3), generalized linear models (6.8), validation statistics (6.7), and other statistics (8.2). Movement toward increasing use of cross-sectional studies, analytic study designs, and statistical methods--representing greater emphasis on needs assessment for health education, health education program development, and program evaluation--indicates the need for better quantitatively trained health educators.

Key Words: program evaluation, research, statistical methods, study designs, training

First published on June 30, 2006, doi:10.1177/1090198106288564

Health Education & Behavior 2007;34:10.

A more recent version of this article appeared on February 1, 2007


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