The development of Perceived Health Competence Scale (PHCS) Japanese version

抄録

The Perceived Health Competence Scale (PHCS), developed by Smith et al (1995) to measure expectancy beliefs regards of health-related habits, is a domain-specific scale of self efficacy. Our objective in this study was to examine the development, reliability, and suitability of design of the Japanese version of the PHCS, specifically by: (1) showing that PHCS correlates with measures of health related lifestyle habits and health status, (2) investigating how personal attributes or the socio-economic status of subjects affects PHCS, and (3) showing that the Perceived Health Competence Scale results may be explained by barriers to information access and general self-efficacy. The subjects of this study were 400 male and female residents living in Tokyo?gA?hward, aged between 20 and 60. The study was performed through a self-administered questionnaire to be completed at subjects' homes. The response rate was 50%, with responses received from 94 males, 105 females and one of unknown gender. The Japanese version of the PHCS has a Cronbach a coefficient of 0.83 and is considered reliable. In research subjects, a relationship was observed between high PHCS and good health habits such as eating breakfast, efforts to eat 30 different kinds of food every day, controlling sodium intake, abstaining from drinking and smoking, weight control, exercise, and awareness of one's own health indicators. No relation was found between PHCS results and environmental factors and health related habits such as the tendency to snack between meals or attend regular health checkups. In contrast, PHCS was influenced by age and educational background, as well as generalized self efficacy and barriers to health related information access. Accordingly, the research was largely successful in showing the reliability and validity of the Japanese version of PHCS.