title: Application of implicit attitude measures to the blood donation context.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Past blood donation research has relied on explicit (self-report) measures to understand blood donation motivations, but has not yet considered the inherent implicit or automatic processing involved in decision-making. This study addresses this limitation by introducing and validating two novel implicit measures of blood donation attitudes.
  
  
  METHODS
  Healthy young adults (n = 253) performed both image and word versions of a Single Target Implicit Association Test (ST-IAT) and then completed self-report measures of blood donation attitudes, blood and needle fears, social desirability, and donation intention.
  
  
  RESULTS
  These results affirmed the validity of the blood donation ST-IATs in at least three ways. First, as expected, nondonors demonstrated more negative implicit donation attitudes than donors. Second, the implicit measures were significantly related in expected directions with explicit measures of donation attitudes as well as blood and needle fears. Finally, implicit donation attitudes were significantly related to donation intention, and the Image ST-IAT (but not the Word ST-IAT) significantly enhanced prediction of donation intention over and above needle fears and marginally enhanced prediction over and above blood fears.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Image and word versions of the blood donation ST-IAT offer a valid method of assessing underlying automatic attitudes toward blood donation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Ohio University, Athens, Ohio 45701, USA.
authors.forename: Regina M
authors.initials: RM
authors.lastname: Warfel
authors.forename: Christopher R
authors.initials: CR
authors.lastname: France
authors.forename: Janis L
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: France
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000339:Affect; D001290:Attitude; D001782:Blood Donors / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D003657:Decision Making / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008954:Models, Biological; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014894:Weights and Measures; D014936:Word Association Tests; D055815:Young Adult