Health literacy predicts Covid‐19 awareness and protective behaviours of university students

Background Health literacy is expected to help individuals deal with the required infection control and knowledge to cope with the COVID‐19 pandemic. Objectives This study examined the impact of health literacy on Covid‐19 awareness and protective behaviours of university students in Pakistan. Metho...

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Published inHealth information and libraries journal Vol. 39; no. 1; pp. 46 - 58
Main Authors Naveed, Muhammad Asif, Shaukat, Rozeen
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published England Wiley Subscription Services, Inc 01.03.2022
John Wiley and Sons Inc
Subjects
Asia, south
COVID-19
COVID-19 - prevention & control
Cross-Sectional Studies
Data analysis
Data collection
Health education
Health Literacy
Humans
Literacy
Original
Pandemics - prevention & control
public health
Questionnaires
SARS-CoV-2
statistics
Students
Surveys and Questionnaires
Universities
University students
Pakistan
students
health literacy
public health
Asia, south
statistics
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ISSN1471-1834
1471-1842
1471-1842
DOI10.1111/hir.12404

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Summary:Background Health literacy is expected to help individuals deal with the required infection control and knowledge to cope with the COVID‐19 pandemic. Objectives This study examined the impact of health literacy on Covid‐19 awareness and protective behaviours of university students in Pakistan. Methods An online questionnaire was used to collect data from students at three universities in Punjab. The approved questionnaire contained 12 statements related to HL, 21 items towards Covid‐19 awareness, and 11 statements related to protective behaviours, along with some demographic data. Data analysis used Pearson correlation and simple linear regression. Results Health literacy of university students positively predicted their Covid‐19 awareness and protective behaviours indicating that students with high health literacy were likely to be more aware of Covid‐19 and adopt health protective behaviours. There were gender and rural/urban differences. Conclusions The results demonstrated an urgent need for planning a needs‐based health literacy programme focusing specifically on Covid‐19 literacy in Pakistan. This research might help policy‐makers, NGOs, and health librarians devise suitable programme.
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ISSN:1471-1834
1471-1842
1471-1842
DOI:10.1111/hir.12404