Increasing Environmental Health Literacy through Contextual Learning in Communities at Risk

Autor: Leif Abrell, Sanlyn Buxner, Jean E.T. McLain, Monica D. Ramirez-Andreotta, Leona F. Davis, Aminata Kilungo
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2018
Předmět:
Program evaluation
Health Knowledge
Attitudes
Practice

Health
Toxicology and Mutagenesis

media_common.quotation_subject
education
lcsh:Medicine
010501 environmental sciences
Informal education
Community action
environmental health risk
01 natural sciences
Article
Literacy
03 medical and health sciences
contextual learning
Environmental health
Humans
Learning
environmental health literacy
hazardous waste sites
0105 earth and related environmental sciences
media_common
environmental justice communities
030505 public health
informal education
lcsh:R
Stressor
Arizona
Community Participation
Public Health
Environmental and Occupational Health

Contextual learning
Citizen journalism
program evaluation
Environmental Exposure
Health Surveys
rainwater harvesting
Health Literacy
Personal experience
0305 other medical science
Environmental Health
Zdroj: International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
Volume 15
Issue 10
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, Vol 15, Iss 10, p 2203 (2018)
ISSN: 1660-4601
DOI: 10.3390/ijerph15102203
Popis: Environmental health literacy (EHL) has recently been defined as the continuum of environmental health knowledge and awareness, skills and self-efficacy, and community action. In this study, an interdisciplinary team of university scientists, partnering with local organizations, developed and facilitated EHL trainings with special focus on rainwater harvesting and water contamination, in four communities with known environmental health stressors in Arizona, USA. These participatory trainings incorporated participants&rsquo
prior environmental health risk knowledge and personal experiences to co-create training content. Mixed methods evaluation was conducted via pre-post participant surveys in all four trainings (n = 53). Participants who did not demonstrate baseline environmental science knowledge pre-training demonstrated significant knowledge increase post-training, and participants who demonstrated low self-efficacy (SE) pre-training demonstrated a significant increase in SE post-training. Participants overall demonstrated a significant increase in specific environmental health skills described post-training. The interdisciplinary facilitator-scientist team also reported multiple benefits, including learning local knowledge that informed further research, and building trust relationships with community members for future collaboration. We propose contextual EHL education as a valuable strategy for increasing EHL in environmental health risk communities, and for building academia-community partnerships for environmental health research and action.
Databáze: OpenAIRE