The evolving concept of health literacy
Abstract
The relationship between poor literacy skills and health status is now well recognized and better understood. Interest in this relationship has led to the emergence of the concept of health literacy. The concept has emerged from two different roots - in clinical care and in public health. This paper describes the two distinctive concepts that reflect health literacy, respectively, as a clinical "risk", or a personal "asset". In the former case a strong science is developing to support screening for poor literacy skills in clinical care and this is leading to a range of changes to clinical practice and organization. The conceptualization of health literacy as an asset has its roots in educational research into literacy, concepts of adult learning, and health promotion. The science to support this conceptualization is less well developed and is focused on the development of skills and capacities intended to enable people to exert greater control over their health and the factors that shape health. The paper concludes that both conceptualizations are important and are helping to stimulate a more sophisticated understanding of the process of health communication in both clinical and community settings, as well as highlighting factors impacting on its effectiveness. These include more personal forms of communication and community based educational outreach. It recommends improved interaction between researchers working within the two health literacy perspectives, and further research on the measurement of health literacy. The paper also emphasizes the importance of more general strategies to promote literacy, numeracy and language skills in populations.
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Accessibility could be affected by user levels of literacy and health literacy.
“One factor will be user levels of literacy and health literacy, in which health literacy is defined as the ability of individuals to gain access to, understand, and use information for health [23].”
From Web-Based Interventions for Behavior Change and Self-Management: Potential, Pitfalls, and Progress (2012) · cites this paper as [23]
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BackgroundAccess to healthy ınformatıon: the ınteractıon of medıa lıteracy and health lıteracy
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“Nutbeam [26] stated that health literacy is the cognitive and social skills with which people can take action to maintain health.”
- Authors
- Nutbeam, D.
- Affiliations
- The University of Sydney (AU)
- Corresponding author
- Nutbeam, Don
- ORCID
- Nutbeam, Don
- Venue
- Social Science & Medicine
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2008-12
- Volume
- 67
- Issue
- 12
- Pages
- 2072-2078
- ISSN
- 0277-9536 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2129716887
- Cited by
- 2,944
- References
- 28
- Citations by year
- 2026: 255 · 2025: 237 · 2024: 224 · 2023: 205 · 2022: 275 · 2021: 228 · 2020: 237 · 2019: 219 · 2018: 196 · 2017: 158 · 2016: 148 · 2015: 138 · 2014: 100 · 2013: 112 · 2012: 92
- FWCI
- 76.49
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Social Science & Medicine (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- ePrints Soton (University of Southampton) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Health Literacy and Information Accessibility
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Patient-Provider Communication in Healthcare
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Cultural Competency in Health Care
- Keywords
- health literacy, literacy skills, health status, clinical care, health promotion, adult learning, health communication, health communication effectiveness, literacy screening, health literacy assessment, numeracy, language skills
- MeSH terms
- Concept Formation, Health Education, Health Status, Humans, Models, Theoretical, Patient Education as Topic, Comprehension
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