Reducing adolescents' perceived barriers to treatment and increasing help-seeking intentions: Effects of classroom presentations by General Practitioners
RIS ID
25028
Abstract
The "Building Bridges to General Practice" (BBGP) program is an outreach initiative. It aims to reduce young peoples' perceived knowledge- and belief-based barriers to engaging in treatment and to increase their behavioral intentions to consult a general medical practitioner (GP) for physical and psychological problems. By increasing intentions, the BBGP program aims to increase actual consultations with a GP for both types of problem. A quasi-experimental nested design was used to evaluate the effect of the intervention in three Australian high schools. A Treatment group (n = 173, M = 16 years) and Comparison group (n = 118, M = 15 years) completed questionnaires of perceived barriers, intentions and self-reported consultations with a GP. Questionnaires were completed 1 week before the intervention, 5 then 10 weeks post-intervention. The Treatment group, but not the Comparison group, showed reductions in perceived barriers over time, increased intentions to consult a GP for psychological problems and a significant correlation between intentions and subsequent GP consultations. Results support the utility of the intervention for improving adolescents' beliefs, intentions and behavior related to consulting a GP for physical and psychological problems.
Publication Details
Wilson, C. J., Deane, F. P., Marshall, K. L. & Dalley, A. (2008). Reducing adolescents'' perceived barriers to treatment and increasing help-seeking intentions: Effects of classroom presentations by General Practitioners. Journal of Youth and Adolescence: a multidisciplinary research publication, 37 1257-1269.