Social norms, misperceptions, and mosquito net use: a population-based, cross-sectional study in rural Uganda

Clicks: 356
ID: 41388
2019
Free PDF
Article Quality & Performance Metrics
Overall Quality
Not rated
Combines reader engagement with the AI quality analysis. This article has not been analysed, so there is no overall score — reader engagement is measured and shown alongside.
AI Quality Assessment
Not analyzed
Readership in this journal
Popular

Ranked #36 of 128 articles by views in malaria journal

Most read Least read

Bar heights use a square-root scale. Only the 120 most-read articles are drawn; the journal has 128 in total.

Mint this article as an NFT
Not yet minted

Create a permanent, verifiable on-chain record of this article on the Scimatic Network. The NFT is held in your Journament account, and you can withdraw it to your own wallet at any time.

5 SUSD one-off · no wallet required
Sign in to mint
Abstract
Abstract Background Mosquito net use is an essential part of malaria prevention. Although previous research has shown that many people sleep under a mosquito net in endemic areas, it is unknown whether people underestimate how common it is to sleep under a net every night. Furthermore, perceived social norms about whether most others sleep under a mosquito net every night may contribute to personally sleeping under a net, given decades of research showing that people often mimic others’ behaviours. Methods Population-based data were collected from 1669 adults across eight villages in one rural parish in southwestern Uganda. Individuals’ perception about whether most adults in their community sleep under a mosquito net every night was compared with whether daily mosquito net use was the actual norm in their community to identify the extent of norm misperception. The association between whether an individual perceived daily mosquito net use to be the norm and personal mosquito net use was assessed while adjusting for the ratio of nets:people in the household and other factors. Results Although the majority (65%) of participants reported sleeping under a mosquito net every night (and 75% did so among the 86% of people with at least one net), one-quarter of participants thought that most adults in their community did not sleep under a mosquito net every night. Another 8% were unsure how many nights per week most adults in their community sleep under a mosquito net. Participants who perceived that daily mosquito net use was the norm were 2.94 times more likely to report personally sleeping under a mosquito net every night (95% CI 2.09–4.14, p < 0.001) compared to participants who thought doing so was not normative, adjusting for other factors. Conclusions Results suggest an opportunity for anti-malarial interventions to reduce misperceptions about mosquito net use norms and emphasize the commonness of daily mosquito net use in malaria-endemic regions. If people correctly perceive most others to sleep under a net every night, then they may personally do so when possible and support others to do so too.
Reference Key
perkins2019socialmalaria Use this key to autocite in the manuscript while using SciMatic Manuscript Manager or Thesis Manager
Authors Perkins, Jessica M.;Krezanoski, Paul;Takada, Sae;Kakuhikire, Bernard;Batwala, Vincent;Tsai, Alexander C.;Christakis, Nicholas A.;Bangsberg, David R.;
Journal malaria journal
Year 2019
DOI
DOI not found
URL
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s12936-019-2798-7
Keywords Keywords not found

Citations

No citations found. To add a citation, contact the admin at info@scimatic.org

Comments

No comments yet. Be the first to comment on this article.