Influenza pandemic preparedness: motivation for protection among small and medium businesses in Australia

Watkins, Rochelle E; Cooke, Feonagh C; Donovan, Robert J; MacIntyre, C Raina; Itzwerth, Ralf; Plant, Aileen J

Protection motivation theory and health belief model concepts have been found to be valuable for understanding and promoting a variety of health-related behaviours [10, 12, 21, 22] , including the performance of protective behaviours during the outbreak of the severe acute respiratory syndrome in Hong Kong [16] . The importance of perceptions about risk and severity in understanding preparedness behaviour suggests that health behaviour theories provide a useful framework for the design of communication strategies that aim to promote preparedness for pandemic influenza among the business community. Based on the temporal relations identified in these theoretical frameworks, our results suggest that communications containing information about risk and severity are likely to promote both threat appraisal and coping appraisal processes, and can motivate protective behaviours given a perceived ability to implement recommended actions. Promotion of the ability to respond effectively to the threat of pandemic influenza appears to be an important factor associated with protective responses to the threat of pandemic influenza. This finding is consistent with research findings based on other health threats which indicates that low levels of self efficacy and response efficacy provide a barrier to action [11, 12] . The high proportion of participants reporting needing help with preparation indicates that self efficacy may be an important factor limiting planning for pandemic influenza, which is consistent with the findings of recent research in Europe and Asia [23] .