Abstract:

Establishment of health-supporting habits in early childhood is of particular importance from the aspect of quality of life in adulthood. Parents and educators play a key role in this process. The health value and health behaviour conveyed by adults are fundamentally related to the level of their health-related knowledge and competences. In recent decades, the concept of health literacy has been created in scientific discourse to describe this phenomenon, which Ratzan and Parker (2000:6) define as follows: ‘the degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate health decisions’. In parallel with the development of the conceptual framework of health literacy, public health literacy surveys (REALM, TOFHLA, HLS-EU, BRIEF) were launched, and then the study of special sub-populations became more and more important (Vann et al., 2013; Hsu et al., 2019), so the health literacy of parents raising young children also became the focus of interest (Sántha, 2021). During studies of parental health literacy, research focused primarily on its differentiating factors and, in this context, on children's health-related knowledge (Bánfai et al., 2022). Until now, the connections between parental health literacy and their children's health-related habit system have not been explored.

Accordingly, the purpose of our research was to explore the health literacy of parents, the health-supporting habits of preschool children, and the connections between them. Our initial hypothesis was the following: children of parents with higher health literacy show a more advanced system of health-related habits. As part of a cross-sectional, quantitative survey, we asked 598 parents of preschool children about their children's daily routine and health-related habits in January 2024. In addition to these, the measurement tool included sociodemographic questions and standardized questionnaires (HLS-EU-Q16; BRIEF) suitable for observing health literacy.

Our results show that the health literacy of parents raising preschool children is more favourable compared to the entire population (both in Hungary and internationally), which may be related to the fact that parents with young children are more often in contact with the healthcare system in connection with childcare and possible illnesses. It is problematic for parents to filter and understand information from the media, to judge the (possible) need for a second medical opinion, and to understand the instructions of the doctor and pharmacist. Regarding children's health-supporting habits, our results show that over the age of five, daily routine actions are more integrated into the habit system (p<0.05), and girls' health-supporting habits are more developed than boys' (p<0.001).

Children of parents with higher health literacy and higher education level have more favourable indicators in the area of habits that require cooperation, consistency and awareness (p<0.05), such as rules related to daily routines, accident prevention, and limitation of media tools.

The enhancement of parental health literacy can contribute to the development of the child's health-supporting habits, thereby laying the foundation for physical, mental and social health in adulthood.

Acknowledgement:
This study was funded by the Scientific Foundations of Education Research Program of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (grant number: SZKF-10/2021).

Keywords:

Health literacy, health-supporting habits, preschool children, parents.