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

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 1 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.