B. Gordijn/H. ten Have (eds), ``Medizinethik und Kultur. Grenzen medizinischen Handelns in Deutschland und den Niederlanden'

Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics -     

Self‐reported attitude scales: current practice in adequate assessment of reliability,validity, and dimensionality

The development of methods to create self‐reported attitude scales has lost momentum, in part because of increased research focused on implicit measures. This paper reviews 162 papers on methodological approaches applied to the validation and assessment of attitude scales. Assessment of methodological approaches applied indicates that neither reliability, validity, nor dimensionality assessments are consistently used according to standard operating procedures or in accordance with best practice. Within current practices in the field of attitude scale development, the full potential of self‐report scales is not met, in part because of such methodological issues. The improvement of existing practices and adoption of promising new developments in attitude scale construction and evaluation are discussed, together with recommendations for best practice in scale validation.     

Trust,Perceived Risk,and Attitudes Toward Food Technologies1

There is substantial empirical evidence that both trust and risk perceptions influence public acceptance of new technologies. We reanalyzed 3 studies (on food technology) to compare whether (a) both trust and perceived risk are independently and directly associated with acceptance, or (b) the relationship between trust and acceptance is mediated by perceived risk. In support of Interpretation a, the (negative) correlation between trust and perceived risk was reduced when controlling for acceptance, whereas the correlation between trust and acceptance was somewhat reduced when controlling for perceived risk. Controlling for trust had little effect on the correlation between perceived risk and acceptance. These findings suggest that expressions of trust and perceived risk often might be reflections of prior attitudes toward the technology.     

Food‐Safety Practices in the Domestic Kitchen: Demographic,Personality, and Experiential Determinants1

The impact of consumer behavior in determining the safety of foods prepared at home has focused so far on the role of isolated consumer practices. In addition, demographic factors have been applied primarily to explain differences between individuals. In this paper, the use of psychological factors to predict scores on the integrated food‐safety score is advocated. In order to assess the relevance of psychological constructs to food‐safety behaviors, several relations are tested at the same time in a structural equation model in which it is demonstrated that the inclusion of psychological determinants leads to a better model for the prediction of food‐related behaviors in comparison to demographic factors alone.