A Content Analysis Study of Korean Researches Based on Health Belief Model: Focusing on Current Status of Research Field and Explanatory Power of HBM

Abstract

Health Belief Model has been widely used to explain individuals health behaviors. This study examined the current status and trends of the research field, and the explanatory power of the theory itself by conducting a content analysis on Korean researches to which the health belief model was applied. We coded and analyzed 111 published in Korea Citation Index(KCI) between 2011 and 2020. Analysis results are as below: First, it was confirmed that the number of studies using the health belief model is increasing. Second, the health belief model is a theoretical framework created to predict the public''s disease prevention behavior, due to which most of the studies have been conducted in the health field such as disease prevention behavior, health checkup behavior, personal hygiene, health promotion behavior, and exercise behavior ect. Third, although self-efficacy was added to HBM during its developing process and has been mentioned least among related studies, it has a stronger predictive power than other factors. Fourth, the study using the health belief model suggested that the presented research model was generally simple. A lack of exploration of predictors affecting factors of Health Belief Model was mentioned as one of our conclusions. This study looked into the current status and trends in the field of Health Belief Model, and we look forward to our study serving as a reference of future research directions and model development.