Psychological factors and demands for breast and cervical cancer screening

Abstract

Objective: The study aims to investigate relationships between demands for breast and cervical cancer screening (BCS/CCS) and related health beliefs. Methods: The study used cluster-randomized sampling and collected data about demands for BCS/CCS and constructs of health beliefs model (HBM). It calculated indices of perceived risk and seriousness of the cancers and perceived effectiveness, benefits and difficulties of the screening; and performed descriptive and multivariate regression analysis of the demands and the HBM constructs. Results: Less than 23.7% of respondents (N = 805) had ever undertaken BCS/CCS but 62.7% reported willingness to receive the service. Demands for BCS/CCS illustrated negative associations (Beta = 0.11 and 0.10) with age but positive (Beta = 0.15 and 0.11) links with education. The absolute values of standardized regression coefficients between the demand and the HBM constructs added up to 0.69 for BCS and 0.64 for CCS respectively, being 4–40 times that of age and education. Conclusions: Models incorporating all HBM constructs have substantially greater power than commonly researched single factors in explaining BCS/CCS demands. Practice implications: Comprehensive BCS/CCS promotion addressing all HBM constructs in a synergetic way may prove to be more effective.