Level of Understanding of Pictogram in Undergraduate Students in Humanities and Social Sciences; A Survey Study

Abstract

Introduction: Pictograms were widely used in various countries such as USA, India and South Africa for communication of health information; because there are no limitations on language and these also increase patient’s memory than text labeling. However, the Universal Pictograms developed by USP-DI had limitations to interpret the image in each population group and there were no study about understanding and pictogram in Humanities and Social Sciences students. This study aimed to explore the understanding of the USP-DI pictograms, the Medication Use Literacy Test score (MULT) in Humanities and Social Sciences students, Mahasarakham University. Methods: This study was a survey study by street survey on various locations. The participants from different faculties completed questionnaires by themselves (self-administration) between August 2014 and April 2015. Moreover, the study was examined the relationship between different factors and understanding of pictograms score. Results: A total of 364 participants, the majority of them were female, first year students, and study in faculty of Accountancy and Management. The majority of participants (88.2%) had MULT score in high level (MULT score > 8), the 12.91% of them understood the pictograms with the total score over 85 percent. With regarding to factors affecting the understanding of pictograms score, the participants with underlying diseases and high MULT score showed a high correlation with a high level of understanding of the pictogram (p<0.05). Conclusion: Even though humanities and social sciences students had high level of MULT score, they had low score of understanding in pictogram. Factors affecting the understanding in pictogram were underlying diseases and MULT score.