We’re taking this Thursday off to give thanks for our enthusiastic readers. Enjoy your turkey (or tofurkey)!
And if there are any topics you’d like us to tackle in 2014, please email wehearthealthliteracy@communicatehealth.com.
We all know change isn’t easy. So when we want our audiences to change their health behaviors, we can’t rely solely on plain language and human-centered design — we also have to get inside their heads.
Here at We ❤ Health Literacy Headquarters, we often turn to trusted theoretical models to help us understand how and why people change. And today, we’re talking about one of our favorites: the Health Belief Model.
Over 50 years ago, social psychologists wanted to find out why people weren’t participating in programs to prevent or screen for disease. After all, these programs were in everyone’s best interest, right? The Health Belief Model was born from this investigation. It explains the desires and beliefs that make people take action to prevent, screen for, and control disease.
The gist of the model is that a person’s behavior depends on their perceived benefits and barriers (also known as a cost-benefit analysis). Knowing these perceptions can help us anticipate how people will respond to recommended health behaviors.
To make your content more effective, try helping your readers answer these questions — all based on elements of the Health Belief Model:
If your content answers these questions, you’ll give your readers the understanding, tools, and confidence they need to make positive, healthy changes.
The bottom line: If you want readers to change their behavior, make sure your health content explains the benefits and barriers to change.
This is Episode 1 of our journey into space. For more adventures, check out Episode 2 and Episode 3.
If you’re a health communicator, it’s important to know that space is your friend. Learn to love space. Don’t see it as an area to fill up with content, but rather as an area to show off the content you already have. Use it strategically.
As we’ve said before, dear readers, people are more likely to skip over content that looks overwhelming or hard to read — even if it’s written using simple words. One trick we’ve already shared is picking the right font. Another trick is to leave more space above your headers than below them.
Why is this a helpful technique? Because having more space above a header than below it creates “chunks” of content that are easy to scan, making your content appear more accessible.
If you have an equal amount of space above and below a header, the header will seem to float and your readers won’t be able to quickly associate it with the body text below.
Who needs to get the flu shot?
Everyone age 6 months or older.
When should I get the flu shot?
As soon as possible, usually in the fall.
But if you don’t leave any white space between headers and body text, your readers won’t be able to scan the content quickly.
Who needs to get the flu shot?
Everyone age 6 months or older.
When should I get the flu shot?
As soon as possible, usually in the fall.
If you leave more space above the header than below it, your readers will thank you.
Who needs to get the flu shot?
Everyone age 6 months or older.
When should I get the flu shot?
As soon as possible, usually in the fall.
The bottom line: Make your content look easy to read by leaving more space above headers than below them.
Most of us public health geeks probably know what a body mass index (BMI) is. As a refresher, it’s a number calculated based on a person’s height and weight. Although it seems like a simple concept, for lots of people, it isn’t.
For starters, it’s a calculation, which means you have to do math. Even if you use the chart that calculates it for you, reading the chart still requires math skills.
Then take its use: health professionals essentially use it as a “red flag” for weight issues. That means when you’re talking about BMI, you’re talking about risk — about what might be true.
And as if that’s not enough, it might not mean anything. That’s right, BMI is an accurate indicator for most — but not all — people.
So you can see, when you take a step back, BMI can be pretty confusing. And you know what else can be confusing? The chart we’re supposed to use to calculate it. Take a look:
For people who have trouble with numeracy, which is most of us (public health professionals included), this chart is anything but easy to use. The color on this “simple” version helps, but try finding your BMI without touching the screen to follow the row and column — it’s not easy. And this is a simple version!
So the next time you find yourself mentioning BMI in a written material, you might want to make sure you’re explaining how and why BMI is used as a screening tool.
Oh, and let’s redesign that chart!
The bottom line: Proceed with caution when mentioning BMI. Be sure to explain what it means, and what it doesn’t. And don’t rely on your readers being able to understand the chart.
What’s the difference between a screening and a test? Do you get screened for high blood pressure, or do you get a blood pressure test? Many people think that screening = test and test = screening, but that’s not always true.
A screening is a test, but not all tests are screenings. Are you having flashbacks to algebra yet?
Let’s clarify: A screening is one kind of test. There are also other kinds of medical tests — which is why “screening” and “test” aren’t always interchangeable.
The next time you need to talk about screening tests in a health material, use something like this plain language definition:
Screenings are medical tests that check for diseases before symptoms appear. Screenings help doctors find diseases early, when they may be easier to treat. Regular mammograms or an HIV test are examples of screening tests.
The other 2 kinds of medical tests are:
Of course, many people just say “test” when talking about any of these procedures — so it’s worth thinking about whether the type of test is need-to-know information for the material you’re writing. If it is, be sure to explain it in plain language!
The bottom line: Be careful when choosing between “screening” and “test.” Screenings are a type of test, but not all tests are screenings.
Do you ever wake up in the morning and think, “I wish I had a guide to help me write and design my health website so everyone can understand it”? Well, you’re in luck!
Health Literacy Online is one of our favorite go-to resources — though we should mention that we’re a little biased because we helped write it. It’s an actionable, step-by-step guide for designing and creating health websites according to user-centered design principles.
The guide walks you through the entire user-centered design process — from creating personas to conducting prototype testing. It will help you write for health and behavior change in a way that really gets results.
The bottom line: We’re big fans of Health Literacy Online, and we think you’ll like it, too!
When writing health information, it’s important to strike a trustworthy and informative tone while remaining positive and supportive. Health writers usually get the trustworthy and informative part down, but we’re often guilty of forgetting about the other half.
Tone is the feeling behind your words, and it’s just as important as the words themselves. Here are 2 rules we follow at We ❤︎ Health Literacy Headquarters to make sure the tone is right:
Think of it this way: Which of these statements motivates you to make your bed?
Taking “don’t” and “should” out of your writing will help you create friendly content. And when your messages have a friendly and positive tone, readers will be more engaged and motivated — especially if you’re encouraging them to do something new or difficult.
Imagine you’ve just seen your doctor and she’s printed out some follow-up instructions for you that say:
DON’T do any activities that put weight on the injured foot. You should rest. Putting weight on the foot will worsen the injury and slow your recovery.
Although this is perfectly accurate advice, how does it make you feel? Discouraged? Negative? Maybe a little bit like you’ve done something wrong already?
Now consider this alternative:
Be sure to keep weight off your injured foot during your recovery, because the tendon needs rest in order to heal. Choose activities that won’t put weight on your foot.
It’s the same message, but a completely different tone. With any luck, this friendlier take will leave you feeling better — and ultimately increase the likelihood that you’ll follow the instructions.
The bottom line: Write without “don’ts” and “shoulds” to create positive, supportive, and effective health content.
Just a mention of the font Comic Sans makes the designers at We ❤ Health Literacy Headquarters shudder. Some might call this font snobbery, but we prefer to think of it as a necessary part of being a dedicated plain language advocate. That’s because fonts are key to making content easy to read (or not).
Users are more likely to skip over content that looks overwhelming or hard to read — even if it’s written using simple words. Think of it like this: Choosing a font for your content is like choosing an actor to star in a play. The actor needs to look the part.
While there are now thousands of fonts to choose from — thanks to services like Adobe Typekit, Cloud.typography, and Google Fonts — this doesn’t necessarily mean that all available fonts are user friendly.
To improve readability:
Lastly, make your font stand out! Show it off by including plenty of white space in the margins and between paragraphs.
The bottom line: For easy-to-read health content, use sans serif fonts and make them at least 12 point or 16 pixels.
With the launch of the Health Insurance Marketplace on October 1, millions of Americans must quickly learn a foreign language: health insurance speak.
Many of these words and concepts are very complicated and technical. The trickiest ones have no simple plain language alternatives. Take the word “deductible.” It’s not an intuitive word, and it’s specific to two of the least understandable subjects: taxes and insurance. Yet understanding this word is key for making important financial decisions.
If we can’t simply substitute a plain language word or phrase for a complicated word, we teach readers about the term instead. That means both explaining what it means and giving examples.
When writing about a health insurance deductible, we might include a section like this:
What is a deductible?
Your deductible is the amount of money you have to pay for your health care before your health insurance plan will start to pay for medical services. In other words, your health insurance plan “kicks in” only after you’ve paid the amount of your deductible out of your own pocket.
For example: Your health plan has a deductible of $1,000. That means that you need to spend $1,000 of your own money on health care before your health insurance plan will start to pay for things.
There are some costs that your insurance will cover before you have paid your full deductible. There are also some costs that may not count toward your deductible. Contact your health insurance company if you have any questions about what’s covered or what counts toward your deductible.
As you can see, this can get a bit wordy. But if you’re able to drive home the meaning of important concepts like “deductible” for your readers, it’s worth it.
The bottom line: Like it or not, “deductible” is here to stay. Help your readers by putting it in context and providing relevant examples.
This week, we wanted to share one of our favorite online resources: usability.gov. Usability.gov is the federal government’s leading resource for free user experience (UX) resources, including guidelines, tips, and tools to help you make content easier to use.
So, why are we talking about usability in We ❤ Health Literacy? Because health literacy isn’t just about words — it’s also about how you organize and present those words. Health information needs to be presented in ways that make it easy to find, read, and use — so readers will want to interact with it.
Check out usability.gov (which was recently redesigned), and you’ll see that the site practices what it preaches. Look for:
Today, people get health information in lots of different ways: from smartphones, tablets, computers, and more. Each of these sources presents its own usability challenges. That’s why we’re glad usability.gov is here to help.
Trust us — you’ll never use a yellow font again. Ever.
The bottom line: How you present health content is just as important as the content itself. Get tips at usability.gov.