Switched On: How the Timing of Aversive Content in Traffic Safety Videos Impact Psychophysiological Indicators of Message Processing.

This study investigates how timing of the introduction of unpleasant emotional tone in a traffic safety video impacts the intensity of the viewer's emotional experience. Traffic safety advertising is a multi-million-dollar business in the United States. In many instances, 30-60 s ads are produced to raise awareness of the consequences of unsafe behaviors with the expectation that simply providing information will motivate safer behaviors. Producing videos intended to generate behavior change requires a complex understanding of what motivates behavior. Behavior change theory, neuroscience, and psychophysiology all provide guidance to improve the persuasive power of traffic safety videos. This study consisted of a 3 (message tone) × 3 (video) × 4 (order) repeated measures within subjects designed experiment. Participants (N = 75) were 20-30-year-old men who were shown nine traffic safety videos. Arousal intensity, attention, and negative emotion were tracked with the psychophysiological measures of skin conductance (measuring intensity of arousal), heart rate (measuring attention paid during the video), and corrugator muscle activation (measuring the negative emotional experience). Videos with three different aversive tones were used, low, high, and videos in which the tone switched from low to high aversive. Aversive tone is defined as stimuli that motivate a desire to escape or avoid something like death or pain. All videos were designed to prevent motor vehicle crashes. The results obtained from this study indicate that when attempting to persuade males aged 20-30 to practice safer driving behaviors, switched message tone appears to be the most effective message design in terms the intensity of emotional arousal and maintenance of attention.

Alcohol use among university students in Sweden measured by an electronic screening instrument.

BACKGROUND: Electronic-based alcohol screening and brief interventions for university students with problem drinking behaviours forms an important means by which to identify risky drinkers. METHODS: In this study an e-SBI project was implemented to assess drinking patterns, and to provide personalised feedback about alcohol consumption and related health problems, to students in a Swedish university. In this study, third semester university students (n = 2858) from all faculties (colleges) at the University were invited to participate in e-SBI screenings. This study employed a randomised controlled trial, with respondents having a equal chance of being assigned to a limited, or full-feedback response. RESULTS: The study shows that high risk drinkers tend to underestimate their own consumption compared to others, and that these high risk drinkers experience more negative consequences after alcohol intake, than other respondents. There was a strong belief, for both high- and low-risk drinkers, that alcohol helped celebrations be more festive. This study also confirms findings from other study locations that while males drank more than females in our study population; females reached the same peak alcohol blood concentrations as males. CONCLUSION: Obtaining clear and current information on drinking patterns demonstrated by university students can help public health officials, university administration, and local health care providers develop appropriate prevention and treatment strategies.

Effectiveness of community-based injury prevention. Long-term injury rate levels, changes, and trends for 14 Swedish WHO-designated Safe Communities.

This study investigates the injury rate levels, changes, and trends between 1987 and 2002 for the 14 Swedish municipalities designated as WHO Safe Communities. The injury rate was defined as the number of injured patients discharged from hospital per 1000 persons. Injury rates were age standardised. Each municipality was compared with its respective municipality group, according to a classification of Sweden's 288 municipalities into nine groups based on numerous structural parameters. The average injury rate levels for the 14 WHO-designated Safe Community municipalities ranged from 11.54 to 19.09 per 1000 population during the study period, which was defined as the time period during which a municipality's injury prevention program has been operational. Eleven of 14 municipalities had higher levels than their corresponding municipality groups. Five of the 14 municipalities "outperformed" their respective municipality groups and achieved a greater relative injury rate decrease during the study period. The trends for the 14 municipalities in relation to their municipality groups showed an inconsistent pattern, with only four municipalities exhibiting overall favourable trends for the study period.

A comparison of unintentional injury patterns occurring in two Swedish communities in 1978 and in 2008.

Surveillance and analyses of unintentional injuries can be used to help prioritise community prevention efforts. This study describes changes in local patterns for unintentional injuries resulting in deaths, hospitalisations, and outpatient visits to health care clinics and emergency rooms, comparing information from two different study periods, 1978 and 2008, in the Swedish communities of Falköping and Lidköping. Injury cases were analysed, and confidence intervals were derived. The study results show that while most injuries decreased comparing the first study period to the second, these changes were only significant in terms of decreases in outpatient care. This study points to the importance of more systematic collection data of injury events treated at the outpatient level, particularly for communities where there are relatively low numbers of injury-related deaths and hospitalisations.

Twenty-five years of bicycle helmet promotion for children in Skaraborg District, Sweden.

The purpose of this study is to describe some of the results of a long-term bicycle helmet campaign for children in Skaraborg District, Sweden. The hospital discharge data for bicycle-related injuries occurring in children under the age of 15 were reviewed, to assess changes in patterns for head and other body injuries. The study shows that head injuries to children as a result of bicycle injuries were reduced between 94 and 99% in the study areas. The tremendous gains in safety for children who ride bicycles in Skaraborg District were the result of not only national policy changes that occurred in the latter half of this study period but also the result of local collaborations based on the Safe Communities model, which were organised during the first part of the study period.

Comparison of highway crash reporting in pakistan with the world health organization injury surveillance guidelines.

OBJECTIVES: To compare the crash reporting system of National Highways & Motorways Police (NH&MP), Pakistan, with the World Health Organization (WHO) injury surveillance guidelines. METHODS: Based on information collected from field observations, key informant interviews, and review of official documents, this note firstly describes the reporting system according to the components of a surveillance system. Then the reporting is compared with WHO criteria for designing and building an injury surveillance system and attributes of such a system. RESULTS: After a crash, a patrol officer communicates the information to the higher police authorities by wireless, fax, and on paper in the first 24 hours. Microcomputer Accident Analysis Package (MAAP) Performa filed by the officers are collected at a central location in the following 4 days, and reports are published biannually. Notable deficiencies in the reporting were nonidentification of stakeholders for data utilization and limited prospects of data recording process modification and its monitoring. Moreover, crash and injury definitions do not conform to international standards practiced elsewhere. CONCLUSION: NH&MP crash reporting needs to be simplified and standardized, and steps should be taken to improve its utilization for prevention purposes.

Tracing the utility of injury surveillance data in Pretoria (South Africa) and Borås (Sweden).

Our research attempted to study the factors that influenced the use of injury data in two cities, representing different injury and socio-economic profiles. In Pretoria, the South African capital city, injury data uptake was constrained by, among other factors, the transitional institutional environment, stakeholders' suspicion of research and the absence of safety promotion champions. In the Swedish city of Borås, injury data uptake was facilitated by well-established research agency-municipality partnerships, injury prevention champions, a receptive political and knowledge driven environment and dedicated resources. The study signified the role of a range of content issues, contextual arrangements, social actors who may or may not operate from a perspective of sufficient consensus and institutional communication processes that may either facilitate or hinder the multiple employment and rapid movement of data along the 'ladder of knowledge utilisation'. Safety promotion researchers may need to expand their roles beyond data production to improve data utility.

Electronic screening and brief intervention for risky drinking in Swedish university students--a randomized controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: The limited number of electronic screening and brief intervention (e-SBI) projects taking place in young adult student populations has left knowledge gaps about the specific methods needed to motivate reduced drinking. The aim of the present study was to compare differences in alcohol consumption over time after a series of e-SBIs was conducted with two groups of young adult students who were considered risky drinkers. The intervention group (IG) (n=80) received extensive normative feedback; the control group (CG) (n=78) received very brief feedback consisting of only three statements. METHOD: An e-SBI project was conducted in naturalistic settings among young adult students at a Swedish university. This study used a randomized controlled trial design, with respondents having an equal chance of being assigned to either the IG or the CG. The study assessed changes comparing the IG with the CG on four alcohol-related measurements: proportion with risky alcohol consumption, average weekly alcohol consumption, frequency of heavy episodic drinking (HED) and peak blood alcohol concentration (BAC). Follow-up was performed at 3 and 6 months after baseline. RESULTS: The study documented a significant decrease in the average weekly consumption for the IG over time but not for the CG, although the differences between the groups were non-significant. The study also found that there were significant decreases in HED over time within both groups; the differences were about equal in both groups at the 6-month follow-up. The proportion of risky drinkers decreased by about a third in both the CG and IG at the 3- and 6-month follow-ups. CONCLUSIONS: As the differences between the groups at 6 months for all alcohol-related outcome variables were not significant, the shorter, generic brief intervention appears to be as effective as the longer one including normative feedback. However, further studies in similar naturalistic settings are warranted with delayed assessment groups as controls in order to increase our understanding of reactivity assessment in email-based interventions among students.

Unintentional drowning in northern Iran: a population-based study.

The Iranian Ministry of Health documented that about 1500 people died from drowning annually in Iran between years 2000 and 2001. This study is a descriptive, retrospective, population-based analysis of 342 unintentional drowning deaths occurring to residents and tourists in Guilan and Mazandran Provinces in Iran over a 1-year period (2005-2006), using multiple data sources. The findings from this study demonstrate that the drowning rate for residents of the study population, 4.24 per 100,000, is much higher than drowning rates for populations in developed economies in Europe. Risk factors for drowning in the study populations include male gender, young age, and swimming in unsupervised areas. Drownings occurred most frequently in rivers, followed by canals and lakes. While much more remains to be done to investigate the problems associated with drowning deaths and injuries in Iran, the information obtained from this study can help point the way to targeted interventions.