Effects of dental health care instruction on knowledge, attitude, behavior and fear

Abstract

Abstract— A field experiment was done to assess the effects of two methods of dental health instruction on knowledge, attitude, reported behavior and fear. Subjects (n=108) were male and female inhabitants of Abcoude, a suburban Dutch village of about 7000 inhabitants. There were three conditions, two experimental and one control. Subjects of experimental condition 1 were given a 30‐min personal instruction on dental hygiene, subjects of experimental condition 2 received the same instruction preceded by a 10‐min instructional film on dental hygiene. Subjects of the control condition received no instruction. Half of each group was pretested. All subjects were posttested 6–12 months after the dental health education. Mean postscores of control subjects were significantly lower than either mean postscores of condition I subjects (on attitude and three behavioral aspects) or mean postscores of condition 2 subjects (on knowledge, attitude and one behavioral aspect). There were no significant differences between the two experimental conditions or between the pretested and not‐pretested groups.