Thesis (M.S.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 92-93). / ix, 93 leaves, bound col. ill. 29 cm

There are estimated to be 840,000 people living with HIV in China (1) of whom 65% are estimated to be in the 16-29 year age group. Since the end of the Cultural Revolution and the opening of China to Western influence, traditional cultural norms have rapidly eroded and China is described as being in the middle of a sexual revolution (2). People are increasingly engaging in behaviours exposing them to the risk of contracting HIV which is spreading from the traditionally high risk populations to the general population via the heterosexual route (3). Comprehensive prevention strategies are necessary to prevent further spread (4). There is evidence that the observed increase in sexual activity is not accompanied by adequate knowledge of HIV transmission. 79% of 18-25 year olds know that HIV/AIDS can be transmitted by sexual intercourse, but a mere 30% know that correct and consistent condom use can protect against HIV transmission (5).<br /> <br /> This exploratory study investigated the factors that influence safe sexual practices amongst female Chinese university students, enabling or preventing them from taking responsibility for their reproductive health. The literature search revealed this to be a largely unexplored area. The study was undertaken amongst third year male and female students, recruited from the Department of Comparative Literature and Media Studies at the Zhongshan University in Guangzhou, China. Data was predominantly collected using two male and two female focus group discussions. Three key informant interviews supported and contextualised the findings. The study revealed that the factors influencing female students&rsquo / ability to adopt safe sexual practices are complex. The recognised shortcomings of sex education in China (6) are compounded by the taboo of sex and the pressure placed on students for the achievement of good grades.<br /> <br /> The university environment exerts a powerful influence. The ease with which mutually beneficial same sex friendships develop in the dormitory can be contrasted with the difficulties faced by couples attempting to conduct relationships. The restrictive university environment has the effect of driving relationships underground. Gender roles are deeply entrenched. The need to conform to the ideal pure, na&iuml / ve, and non-inquiring female stereotype affects a female student&rsquo / s ability to source sexual health information, negotiate safe sex, and to adopt safe sexual practices. Two distinct male stereotypes emerged: the traditional more gender equal male, and the liberal male who believes in an earlier age of sexual initiation and condones multiple sexual partners. All students are aware of HIV but have misconceptions about the specifics of HIV transmission, believing that HIV can be transmitted by kissing, from unclean baths and from doctors. Some students were of the belief that poor personal hygiene is an indicator of possible HIV positive status. Students were confused by condom quality issues. As they had received no formal condom training students relied on reading the package instructions or working it out for themselves.<br /> This small exploratory study resulted in the production of rich and surprising findings. These are incorporated into recommendations for future research and a comprehensive sex education programme at the university. Abstinence and mutual monogamy should be emphasised. Gender stereotypes that influence behaviour and choice of sex education materials should be acknowledged. Negotiation skills training should be incorporated together with condom and contraceptive advice. A sexual health page on the student website and a training programme for students to become peer-to-peer sex educators should be introduced.

Thesis (M.S.P.H.)--University of Michigan, 1936.

Thesis (M.S.P.H.)--University of Michigan, 1936.

No description available.

M.Tech. (Homeopathy) / The common cold and influenza (flu) are both acute viral infections affecting the upper respiratory tract (Beers & Porter, 2006). The common cold typically presents with rhinorrhea, sneezing, and a sore throat (Kansal & Kaushal, 2004), and influenza causes fever, coryza, cough, headache, malaise and body pain (Beers & Porter, 2006). Millions of school and work days are missed annually due to cold and influenza symptoms (Fendrick et al., 2003). Students at universities have a high incidence of colds and influenza due to raised levels of stress and close contact with other infected individuals (Zachary, 2006). Researchers believe that Interleukin-6 (a protein in the body responsible for co-ordination of immune response) may be a biological link between psychological stress and the severity of cold and influenza symptoms. This may make students more susceptible to the common cold and influenza (Mercola, 1999). Conventional treatment for both conditions is comprised of analgesics, antipyretics, antibiotics, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs or anti-viral drugs, all of which have numerous adverse effects (Roxas & Jurenka, 2007). Linctagon® Forte capsules consists of four ingredients: Pelargonium sidoides (333mg), Quercetin (80mg), Bromelain (53mg) and Zinc (5mg) and are purported to provide antiviral support in the treatment of colds and influenza. The aim of this eight-day, double-blind, placebo-controlled study was to assess the efficacy of Linctagon® Forte Capsules in the treatment of cold and influenza symptoms on first and second year Health Sciences students from the University of Johannesburg. Thirty seven students from the first and second year Health Sciences Faculty of the University of Johannesburg, suffering from common cold or influenza symptoms, were recruited to participate. This included male and female students between the ages of 18 to 30 years. Advertisements (Appendix A) were placed at the UJ Health Training Centre, classrooms and on campus, with relevant permission given. Thirty participants completed the study and seven students did not complete due to poor compliance. The inclusion and exclusion criteria were dealt with by completion of a Participant Information and Consent Form (Appendix B) as well as a Participant Profile Form which recorded all initial symptoms (Appendix C). All participants were required to have a minimum of five of the ten symptoms represented on the Participant Profile form (Appendix C). Once participants were accepted into the study they were allocated to either Group A or Group B, with 15 participants in each group. The medication bottles were packaged and labelled by Nativa (24 capsules in a 100mg container), and the active medication and the placebo were randomised by means of a coding system, Batch “A” and Batch “B”. Group A received the Linctagon® Forte Capsules and Group B received the unmedicated lactose capsules. The participants were requested to take 1 capsule three times per day. Each participant was given eight Symptom Score Cards (Appendix D) to complete each card every morning and evening for the eight day period, to rate the severity of their symptoms according to a 5-point rating system. The influenza and common cold symptoms were analysed according to their decrease in frequency and intensity over the set period of time. Data was only recorded and analysed for days one to seven due to poor compliance by participants in both groups with regards to completion of the Symptom Score Cards towards the end of the study. Both the treatment (Group A) and the placebo (Group B) groups showed similar improvement in symptom severity over the entire research period, and there was no statistical significance between the two groups. This shows neither group outperformed the other, supporting the null hypothesis. Small sample size, the placebo effect and low dosages of certain of the active ingredients are possible factors involved in the results seen, and should be considered for future studies.

Physical inactivity and resultant chronic diseases of lifestyle (CDLs) are becoming a global epidemic as secular modernization and the sedentary lifestyles it brings with it become universal. The importance of physical activity (PA) in reducing morbidity and mortality from CDLs and related conditions has been well established. Since it is generally significant that the onset of many CDLs lies in childhood through to adolescence, preventative strategies should start as early in life as possible. Currently, university students are failing to engage in the levels of PA recommended for better health outcomes over the short and long term. To make matters worse, there is increasing evidence of a decrease in PA during the transitional phase from adolescence to adulthood. This study aimed to determine the physical activity (PA) levels, sedentary behaviour and health-related fitness (HRF) characteristics of female university students. In addition, the participants‘ perceived barriers to PA were investigated. The study was exploratory-descriptive and employed a quantitative research design. Five hundred and thirty-one full-time female students, between the ages of 18 and 46, studying at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University‘s (NMMU) South, North, Second Avenue and Missionvale campuses participated in the study. The participants (n=531) completed an online survey which determined their PA levels, sedentary behaviours and perceived barriers to PA participation. A health-related fitness (HRF) assessment was also administered to 68 participants who completed the online survey. Their height, weight, and waist and hip circumferences were measured, as well as their cardiovascular fitness (CF). The majority (88 percent) of the participants reported low and minimal levels of PA, and 44 percent were either overweight or obese. The participants had a low-risk waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) (M=0.70). The majority of the population (94 percent) had poor cardiovascular fitness (CF). A high prevalence of sitting time was recorded among the participants: on average 855 minutes (14 hours) on a usual weekday and 720 minutes (12 hours) on a usual weekend day. Students reported the greatest length of sitting time at work/attending lectures/studying. Cross tabulations and Chi2 tests indicated no significant relationships among PA and HRF (BMI, WHR and CF) and sedentary behaviour and HRF. The ANOVA and t-test results for PA, sedentary behaviour and HRF related to various demographic variables, found small (0.19 < d < 0.50) and medium (0.49 < d < 0.80) significant differences by race (d=0.43; d=0.52), home language (d=0.41; d=0.44) and living arrangement (d=0.38; d=0.28). No significant relationship was found to exist between age, year of study and faculty of registration and sedentary behaviour or HRF. The participants listed: Not enough time; too expensive to exercise; and, no friends who can exercise with me as the most important barriers to participation in PA. Academic obligations (3.08 mean) was found to be the most important barrier to PA.

This study assesses practices of college students (N=913) toward alternative medicine, relationships of students' health locus of control with practices of alternative medicine, and relationships of students' attitudes toward alternative medicine and health locus of control. A principal components factor analysis established construct validity of the author-designed Attitude Toward Alternative Medicine Scale, extracting three factors: Holistic Attitude/Control, Safety, and Satisfaction. Holistic Attitude/Control predicted use of alternative medicine (Wald =61.9, p < .01). A principal components factor analysis established construct validity of the Multidimensional Health Locus of Control Scale, extracting three factors: Internal Health Locus of Control, External-Chance, and External-Powerful Others. Internal Health Locus of Control significantly correlated with Holistic Attitude/Control (r = .35, p =.01).

Background: Evidence has indicated a high prevalence of physical inactivity and insufficient consumption of fruit and vegetables among Chinese college students. As college students are in a crucial transition stage from adolescent to adulthood, such unhealthy lifestyle behaviors at this stage can result in nemerous negative consequences for both individuals and society. Therefore, it is urgently necessary to promote health-enhancing physical activity (HEPA) and fruit-vegetable consumption (FVC) among Chinese college students. Interventions focused on multiple health behavior change (MHBC) have shown advantages over those targeting only a single health behavior, and have therefore gained popularity over the last decade. Despite the increasing use of Internet technology and apparent promise of web-based MHBC interventions, there have been few such interventions for HEPA and FVC among Chinese college students. In addition, within the overarching scope of web-based MHBC interventions, there are several remaining questions that need to be addressed, including the timing of MHBC intervention delivery, the high dropout rate of participants, and the psychological mechanisms behind MHBC. Purpose: The main purposes of the thesis were to (1) examine the comparative effectiveness of sequentially delivered web-based MHBC interventions for HEPA and FVC in Chinese college students from both quantitative and qualitative perspectives; (2) investigate characteristics of dropouts (using quantitative method) and the underlying reasons (using qualitative method); and (3) identify the active ingredients ("key mediators") of successful health interventions for changing single health behavior (HEPA or FVC), and examine the psychological mechanisms of MHBC (HEPA and FVC) in Chinese college students based on an integrated social-cognitive model. Method: In Study 1, two web-based MHBC interventions were developed based on the health action process approach (HAPA) model. In a randomized controlled trial (RCT), 552 eligible college students (M = 19.99 years, SD = 1.04, 58.3% female) were randomly assigned to one of three groups: HEPA-first (4 weeks of HEPA followed by 4 weeks of FVC intervention), FVC-first (4 weeks of FVC followed by 4 weeks of HEPA intervention), and a control group (8 weeks of placebo treatment unrelated to HEPA or FVC). All of the participants were asked to complete online questionnaires at four time-points: at baseline (T1, the beginning of the intervention), after 4 weeks (T2, after the first behavior intervention), after 8 weeks (T3, after the second behavior intervention), and after 12 weeks (T4, 1-month post-intervention follow-up). The questionnairs addressed health behaviors (HEPA and FVC), social- cognitive determinants of behavior change (intention, self-efficacy, planning, and social support for each behavior) and health outcomes (BMI, depression and perceived quality of life). All of the data were analyzed using IBM SPSS 25.0, applying a series of generalized linear mixed models (GLMMs) to evaluate the intervention effectiveness. The mediation analysis was performed using IBM SPSS Process, with residualized change scores and the bias-corrected bootstrap approach (5000 resamples). Following the quantitative intervention study, to further evaluate the effects of aforementioned web-based MHBC interventions and to address dropout issues from a qualitative perspective, 30 students (M = 19.53 years, SD = 0.92, 56.7% female) who had participanted in Study 1 (18 completers and 12 dropouts), were invited to attend one-to-one and face-to-face semi-structured interviews (Study 2). The interviews covered three topics: 1) students' perceptions about their changes after participating in the web-based health program, 2) students' user experience and suggestions related to the design of the intervention content and the website layout and functionality, and 3) the reasons for dropping out. The audio-recorded interview data was transcribed orthographically and organized using QSR NVivo 11. Thematic analysis was adopted to analyze the qualitative data. In addition, a two-layer integrated social-cognitive model was hypothesized in Study 3 based on the HAPA model and Carry-over and Compensatory Action Model (CCAM). With a prospective design, 322 college students (M = 19.47 years, SD = 0.99, 55.6% female) were invited to report their past HEPA and FVC behavior, HEPA and FVC intentions, and demographics at baseline. After two months, an online questionnaire survey was used to collect data on their compensatory cognitions, combined volitional predictors of behavior change (self-efficacy + planning), and current HEPA and FVC behavior. All of the data were analyzed using Mplus 8.0. The proposed model was examined using structural equation modeling (SEM) with path analysis approach. Results: (1) Both the quantitative and the qualitative data fully supported the effectiveness of the web-based MHBC interventions for HEPA and FVC behavior. In addition, the effects on social-cognitive determinants of behavior change were partially supported by the quantitative data, and fully supported by the qualitative data. For health outcomes, the quantitative data supported the intervention effects on body mass index (BMI), and the qualitative data supported the effffects on both BMI and perceived quality of life. Moreover, the two delivery sequences did not show significantly different effects on HEPA after either 8 weeks or 12 weeks, whereas the FVC-first sequence showed superior effects over the HEPA-first sequence for FVC behavior after 12 weeks. (2) In terms of dropout, more male than female students withdrew from the interventions, and the dropouts showed lower HEPA self-efficacies, lower FVC planning, and inferior BMI status than completers. The interview results indicated two themes of dropout reasons: internal reasons (e.g., participants perceiving the health interventions as less necessary and less important) and external reasons (e.g., unfavorable living surroundings and problems with the program's delivery mode, intervention content, and technology). (3) In terms of the mediators of successful interventions for changing each single health behavior, the RCT results indicated that self-efficacy and intention mediated the effectiveness of the intervention on immediate changes (after 8 weeks) in HEPA and FVC, and that intention had a mediating effect on sustained change (after 12 weeks) in both HEPA and FVC. In addition, the prospective study found that the two- layer integrated social-cognitive model proposed in this thesis successfully explained the psychological mechanisms of MHBC in Chinese college students. In particular, the first layer identified the mediating effects of the volitional predictors on the intention-behavior relation for each type of health behavior. The second layer identified a positive association between volitional predictors of HEPA and volitional predictors of FVC, as well as a mediating effect of compensatory cognition between FVC intention and HEPA behavior. Discussion and Conclusions: To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to examine the comparative effectiveness of sequentially delivered web-based MHBC interventions on HEPA and FVC in Chinese college students, and the first to identify the psychological mechanisms of MHBC in a Chinese context. The findings provide both theoretical and practical implications for future research and the application of MHBC. Future studies should more comprehensively compare simultaneous vs. sequential designs, more systematically examine dropout and its determinants, and further explore the psychological mechanisms of MHBC, especially the transfer mechanisms between the volitional predictors of one health behavior on another

Atherosclerosis is a disease of the arteries and is defined as a form of arteriosclerosis in which fatty lesions called atheromatous plaques form on the intima of arteries. The formation of these plaques begins early, within the first two decades of life, and may be started by damage to the endothelial cells and intima of the artery walls (Guyton, 1981). A number of factors may cause the initial damage, including physical abrasion of the endothelium, abnormal substances in the blood or pulsating arterial pressure on the vessel wall (Guyton, 1981). There is a growing body of epidemiologic, genetic, experimental, and clinical evidence to support the hypothesis that there is a cause and effect relationship between high blood levels of cholesterol and the development of atherosclerosis in humans. The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship of exercise and diet in predicting the total cholesterol/high density lipoprotein-cholesterol (TC/HDL-C) ratio in college age males and females. Variables controlled for included age, gender, smoking, medication use, contraceptive use, hormone use and intense physical activity.