Cad Saude Publica. 2005 Jan-Feb;21(1):200-6. doi: 10.1590/s0102-311x2005000100022. Epub 2005 Jan 28.

[Health education: knowledge, social representation, and illness].

Cadernos de saude publica

[Article in Portuguese]
Maria Flávia Gazzinelli, Andréa Gazzinelli, Dener Carlos dos Reis, Cláudia Maria de Mattos Penna

PMID: 15692653 DOI: 10.1590/s0102-311x2005000100022

Abstract

This article discusses the theory and practice of health and education, beginning with the notion of the hegemony (in health education practice) of strategies linked to the notion that to grasp established knowledge always leads to the acquisition of new behaviors and practices. Five different axioms have oriented education and health practices, either juxtaposed or at different moments: (1) the notion of overcoming the determination of knowledge over practices; (2) the determination of representations over practices; (3) the analysis of representations within the traditional framework of right and wrong; (4) reciprocity between representations and practices; and (5) the importance of considering practices amenable to re-elaboration through representations, thus situating experience in understanding subjects' illness processes, as well as the way subjects culturally construct illness. The article highlights the need for a link between social representations and illness-as-experience in health education practices.

MeSH terms

• Disease / psychology
• Health Education*
• Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice*
• Humans
• Social Perception*

Publication Types

• English Abstract
• Journal Article