ABSTRACT

School-based health interventions are potentially an effective method to communicate health messages to adolescents. Unfortunately, effectiveness of such interventions is limited. Research in other contexts has shown that interpersonal communication can influence the effectiveness of health programs, but this has not been thoroughly tested for school-based health interventions. Therefore, our study investigated interpersonal communication (i.e., conversational valence and frequency) in a school-based intervention context. We used a three-wave randomized-controlled trial with 1056 students to study three aims. The first aim was to investigate the influence of a health intervention on conversational frequency and valence about drinking, snacking, and exercising. Our second aim was to investigate the influence of conversational frequency and valence on (predictors of) drinking, snacking, and exercising. Our third aim was to investigate whether the health intervention indirectly influenced the program outcomes through conversational frequency and valence. Findings showed that conversational frequency and valence were related to (predictors of) the three behaviors. Additionally, findings showed that the intervention did not influence conversational frequency and valence. Accordingly, findings showed no indirect influence of the intervention on program outcomes through conversational frequency and valence. Our findings show the potential of interpersonal communication for health behaviors and predictors; however, they also stress the importance of a health intervention to properly influence interpersonal communication. If health interventions can successfully influence interpersonal communication, intervention effectiveness can be improved.

摘要

以学校为基础的健康干预措施可能是向青少年传达健康信息的有效方法。不幸的是，这种干预的有效性是有限的。其他背景下的研究表明，人际交流会影响健康计划的有效性，但这尚未针对以学校为基础的健康干预措施进行彻底测试。因此，我们的研究调查了以学校为基础的干预环境中的人际交流（即会话效价和频率）。我们使用了一项包含 1056 名学生的三波随机对照试验来研究三个目标。第一个目的是调查健康干预对饮酒、吃零食和锻炼的谈话频率和效价的影响。我们的第二个目标是调查谈话频率和效价对饮酒、吃零食和锻炼（预测因素）的影响。我们的第三个目标是调查健康干预是否通过对话频率和效价间接影响项目结果。研究结果表明，对话频率和效价与这三种行为（预测因素）有关。此外，研究结果表明，干预不会影响对话频率和效价。因此，研究结果表明干预不会通过对话频率和效价对项目结果产生间接影响。我们的研究结果显示了人际交流对健康行为和预测因素的潜力；然而，他们还强调健康干预对适当影响人际交流的重要性。如果健康干预能够成功地影响人际交流，干预的有效性就可以提高。