Friday, April 1, 2011
Exhibit Hall Poster Area 2 (Convention Center)
The purpose of the study was to use a two-phase sequential exploratory mixed methods design to explore adolescent athletes' views about sun protection and skin cancer. Two research questions guided the study: a) what factors affect adolescent athletes' knowledge, outcome expectations, and behaviors of sun protection; and b) how valid and reliable is the Sun Protection of Athletes Instrument? Qualitative and quantitative phases included cognitive interviewing to explore constructs of Social Cognitive Theory and athletes' understanding of survey items, piloting a new survey with 803 Alabama student athletes, and estimating psychometric properties. Fourteen males and females representing six spring sports participated in two rounds of interviews resulting in survey revision to improve content and format. The revised survey was field tested during spring sport events attended by athletes from 108 schools and each state board district. Exploratory factor analysis revealed a three-factor solution explaining 60% of the variance for the outcome expectation section of the instrument. For the behavior section, a four-factor solution explained 69% of the variance. A two-factor solution for the knowledge section explained 54% of the variance. Presenters will emphasize advantages of a mixed methods research for instrument development to measure determinants of health behavior. The combination of cognitive interviews and exploratory factor analysis enhanced researchers' understanding of sun protection as perceived by adolescent athletes.