Attitudes towards oral health among parents of 6-year-old children at risk of developing caries.
OBJECTIVE
Parental attitudes are likely to play a role in achieving and maintaining a desired level of oral health in children. To be useful in individually delivered caries prevention programmes, parental attitudes should be identified at individual level. Q-methodology has been proved successful in identifying attitudes in a wide range of disciplines but in dentistry Q-studies are scarce. In this study Q-methodology was used to identify parents' prevailing attitudes towards the oral health of their children.


METHODS
Thirty-nine parents ranked 37 statements regarding the dental health behaviour they apply to their 6-year-old child. They later explained their rankings during a short interview. In Q-methodology, rather than reporting one average composite attitude and opinion, various combinations of opinions and attitudes concerning these statements are identified using by-person factor analysis.


RESULTS
Based on their beliefs, attitudes and cognitions, five categories of parents were found: (i) conscious and responsible, (ii) trivializing and fatalistic, (iii) appearance-driven and open-minded, (iv) knowledgeable but defensive and (v) conscious and concerned.


CONCLUSIONS
Q-methodology appears to be a fruitful way to structure the complexity of parents' opinions and attitudes towards their children's dental health. It appears that Q-methodology provides comprehensive clusters of individual attitudes, based on various levels of responses to a wide range of questions. The five identified profiles may be useful in developing tailor-made prevention strategies in caries prevention.
Vermaire
J H
JH
Department of Social Dentistry and Behavioural Sciences, Academic Centre for Dentistry Amsterdam (ACTA), Amsterdam, The Netherlands. e.vermaire@acta.nl
Hoogstraten
J
J
van Loveren
C
C
Poorterman
J H G
JH
van Exel
N J A
NJ
D001294:Attitude to Health; D002648:Child; D003731:Dental Caries / Q000209:etiology / Q000517:prevention & control / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D009426:Netherlands; D009909:Oral Health; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D010290:Parents / Q000523:psychology*; D012307:Risk Factors; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires