Abstract
Caries and gingivitis are major and chronic problems in dental public health especially among adolescence. In particular junior high school students, they lack continuous oral health care. The present study adopts PRECEDE model as a study’s framework to determine association of predisposing, reinforcing, and enabling factors with oral health promotion behavior in ninth graders. The study was a cross-sectional analytical design. The population was ninth graders who lived in Maesai district, Chiang Rai province during academic year of 2015. Sample size was estimated by proportion of factor. Three hundred and seventy-five students were simple randomly selected from 13 schools in Maesai district. The study instrument was a questionnaire asking general information, enabling factors, predisposing factors, reinforcing factors, and oral health behavior. Data analyses were performed using descriptive statistics, chi-square, Pearson’s correlation for univariate, and multivariate ordinal logistic regressions were used to analyze adjusted effects of independent factors. Data were presented using Pearson’s correlation coefficient, adjusted odds ratio and 95% confidence interval. The results revealed that parent’s education had significant association with oral health behaviors. Correlation analyses found that knowledge had a significant inverse correlation with oral behavior (r=-0.164, p=0.001). While attitude, values, and enabling factors had significant positive correlations with oral health behavior (r=0.119, p=0.021; r=0.152, p=0.003; and r=0.392, p<0.001 respectively). By multivariate analysis, fac¬tors that positively affected on oral health behavior were the opportunity expansion school with the highest education of grade 9 (adj. OR 1.70; 95%CI 1.12-2.57, p=0.012), parent with graduate degree compared to those with no/primary school education (adj. OR 2.58; 95%CI 1.19-5.59, p=0.016), value of food consumption (adj. OR1.32; 95%CI 1.04-1.68), and enabling factors (adj. OR 1.60; 95%CI 1.25- 2.05). But knowledge negatively affected on behavior (adj. OR 0.60; 95%CI 0.43-0.82). These findings will facilitate planning and guidance for dentistry personnel in changing oral health behaviors among grade 9 students.
