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Associations between Knowledge of the Causes and Perceived Impacts of Climate Change: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Medical, Public Health and Nursing Students in Universities in China

This study aimed to measure the knowledge and perceptions of medical, public health, and nursing students about climate change and its impacts, and to identify associations between the knowledge and perceptions. Data were from a nationwide cross-sectional survey of 1387 students sampled in five diff...

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Autores principales: Yang, Lianping, Liao, Wenmin, Liu, Chaojie, Zhang, Na, Zhong, Shuang, Huang, Cunrui
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6313669/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30486282
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15122650
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author Yang, Lianping
Liao, Wenmin
Liu, Chaojie
Zhang, Na
Zhong, Shuang
Huang, Cunrui
author_facet Yang, Lianping
Liao, Wenmin
Liu, Chaojie
Zhang, Na
Zhong, Shuang
Huang, Cunrui
author_sort Yang, Lianping
collection PubMed
description This study aimed to measure the knowledge and perceptions of medical, public health, and nursing students about climate change and its impacts, and to identify associations between the knowledge and perceptions. Data were from a nationwide cross-sectional survey of 1387 students sampled in five different regional universities in China (April–May 2017). The knowledge and perceptions of the participants were collected by self-administered questionnaires. We found that most respondents believed that climate change is generally “bad” (83%) and bad for human health (88%), while 67% believed that climate change is controllable. The vast majority of respondents acknowledged illness conditions resulting from poor air quality (95%), heat stress (93%), and extreme weather events (91%) as potential impacts of climate change. Nevertheless, only 39% recognized malnutrition as a consequence of food deprivation resulting from climate change. Around 58% of respondents could correctly identify the causes of climate change. The knowledge of the causes of climate change was not associated with the ability to recognize the health consequences of climate change. However, the knowledge of causes of climate change was a significant predictor of increased awareness of the negative impacts of climate change between the medical and nursing students, although this was not the case among their public health counterparts. Poor knowledge about the causes of climate change is evident among students in China. They are able to recognize the direct links between weather events and health, but less likely to understand the consequences involving complicated pathways. Research and training into the underlying mechanisms of health impacts of climate change needs to be strengthened.
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spelling pubmed-63136692019-06-17 Associations between Knowledge of the Causes and Perceived Impacts of Climate Change: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Medical, Public Health and Nursing Students in Universities in China Yang, Lianping Liao, Wenmin Liu, Chaojie Zhang, Na Zhong, Shuang Huang, Cunrui Int J Environ Res Public Health Article This study aimed to measure the knowledge and perceptions of medical, public health, and nursing students about climate change and its impacts, and to identify associations between the knowledge and perceptions. Data were from a nationwide cross-sectional survey of 1387 students sampled in five different regional universities in China (April–May 2017). The knowledge and perceptions of the participants were collected by self-administered questionnaires. We found that most respondents believed that climate change is generally “bad” (83%) and bad for human health (88%), while 67% believed that climate change is controllable. The vast majority of respondents acknowledged illness conditions resulting from poor air quality (95%), heat stress (93%), and extreme weather events (91%) as potential impacts of climate change. Nevertheless, only 39% recognized malnutrition as a consequence of food deprivation resulting from climate change. Around 58% of respondents could correctly identify the causes of climate change. The knowledge of the causes of climate change was not associated with the ability to recognize the health consequences of climate change. However, the knowledge of causes of climate change was a significant predictor of increased awareness of the negative impacts of climate change between the medical and nursing students, although this was not the case among their public health counterparts. Poor knowledge about the causes of climate change is evident among students in China. They are able to recognize the direct links between weather events and health, but less likely to understand the consequences involving complicated pathways. Research and training into the underlying mechanisms of health impacts of climate change needs to be strengthened. MDPI 2018-11-26 2018-12 /pmc/articles/PMC6313669/ /pubmed/30486282 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15122650 Text en © 2018 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Yang, Lianping
Liao, Wenmin
Liu, Chaojie
Zhang, Na
Zhong, Shuang
Huang, Cunrui
Associations between Knowledge of the Causes and Perceived Impacts of Climate Change: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Medical, Public Health and Nursing Students in Universities in China
title Associations between Knowledge of the Causes and Perceived Impacts of Climate Change: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Medical, Public Health and Nursing Students in Universities in China
title_full Associations between Knowledge of the Causes and Perceived Impacts of Climate Change: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Medical, Public Health and Nursing Students in Universities in China
title_fullStr Associations between Knowledge of the Causes and Perceived Impacts of Climate Change: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Medical, Public Health and Nursing Students in Universities in China
title_full_unstemmed Associations between Knowledge of the Causes and Perceived Impacts of Climate Change: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Medical, Public Health and Nursing Students in Universities in China
title_short Associations between Knowledge of the Causes and Perceived Impacts of Climate Change: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Medical, Public Health and Nursing Students in Universities in China
title_sort associations between knowledge of the causes and perceived impacts of climate change: a cross-sectional survey of medical, public health and nursing students in universities in china
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6313669/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30486282
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15122650
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