Influence of contest on Chinese college students’ health literacy based on repeated cross-sectional studies

Abstract

Objective: Chinese college students’ level of health literacy is low, so, we explored the effect of knowledge contests on health literacy (HL) among Chinese college students. Participants: Students from universities in Jiangsu, China. Methods: Two repeated cross-sectional studies were used to compare the effects of the college students’ contests. Chi-square tests and variance analysis were used to compare the HL levels and scores, respectively; logistic regression was used for multivariate analysis. Results: The levels of HL after each contest were significantly higher than those in the baseline survey (p < .05). There were statistically significant score differences (p = .023 and p = .001) after the contests in the two studies. Multivariable analysis of HL contest showed that school, grade, profession, completion time, and contest history were statistically significant. Conclusions: HL among Chinese college students was low and it is helpful to regularly hold health knowledge contests to improve these levels, especially for most non-medical students.

Keywords:

• Chinese
• college students
• contest
• health literacy

Acknowledgment

The authors would like to like to thank School of Public Health, of Southeast University and Jiangsu Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention for providing resources and support.

Conflict of interest disclosure

The authors have no conflicts of interest to report. The authors confirm that the research presented in this article met the ethical guidelines, including adherence to the legal requirements, of China and received approval from the Institutional Review Board of Southeast University.

Additional information

Funding

Funding was provided by Chinese National Natural Fund [grant numbers 81573258] and Jiangsu graduate practical innovation program [grant numbers SJCX18_0075].