Factors Affecting eHealth Literacy of Early Adolescents: School-based Research

ABSTRACT

The purpose of the research were to describe eHealth literacy and identify factors affecting the eHealth literacy of early adolescents. This descriptive and correlational study was conducted in a government secondary school in the west of Turkey. The research sample consisted of 1347 adolescents in the sixth, seventh, and eighth grades in the academic year 2016–2017. An adolescents’ description form and the eHealth Literacy Scale (eHEALS) were used to collect the data. The mean score on eHEALS was 23.81 ± 6.94. Multiple regression analysis showed that being in the 11–12 year age group (β = 0.528, p < 0.001), having a father with a high school or university level education (β = 0.055, p = 0.038), and carrying out research in the internet on health related topics (β = 0.118, p < 0.001) were determinant at 32% (F = 56.901, p < 0.001, R² = 0.32) on the adolescents’ eHealth literacy. The mean eHEALS score in the study demonstrated that the e-health literacy of the adolescents was rather low and inadequate, and that there were gaps in the adolescents’ knowledge and skills about how and where to find quality eHealth information. Nurses are expected to provide eHealth literacy training that will help to find information on the internet and interpret and assess it, and this will develop eHealth literacy of adolescents. Integrating online health information sources into the school health education curriculum in line with developed strategies can be suggested because it is an attempt to improve the eHealth literacy of adolescents.

KEYWORDS:

• e-health
• health literacy
• health resources
• internet
• adolescents

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Authors’ contributions

All authors conceptualized the study and organized the data collection. SD and AK wrote the first draft of the manuscript. SD and AK performed the analyses and wrote the results section. SD and AK designed the study and revised the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.