AJHE Table of Contents
Health Literacy and Health Education: Research and Practical Applications
Kerry J. Redican
Helen Osbourne states in her book, Health Literacy from A to Z, that health literacy is about
communicating health information in ways others can understand. It has three central components: communication skills
of the person expressing a message; learning needs of each person. This statement underscores The Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention’s statement that health literacy is important in both personal and organizational contexts and
accomplished through: (1) emphasizing people’s ability to use health information rather than just understand it; (2)
focusing on the ability to make “well-informed” decisions rather than “appropriate” ones; (3) incorporating a public
health perspective; and (4) acknowledge that organizations have a responsibility to address health literacy. These
statements provide a good context for examining the relationship between health literacy and health
education.
Health Literacy continues to be an important component of health education regardless of the
practice setting. Most, if not all of us in health education use and/or operationalize health literacy concepts in our
work. Given all the recent attention on the importance of health literacy, the Editorial Board of the American Journal
of Health Education (AJHE) felt that it would be helpful to the profession to dedicate a special issue to Health
Literacy and Health Education. In Spring, an invitation to submit manuscripts for the special AJHE issue on Health
Literacy and Health Education: Research and Practical Applications was widely distributed.
Many excellent articles were submitted and accepted. The majority of the articles are included in
this issue but because of space limitations a few of the articles will appear in a future AJHE issue. This special
issue of the American Journal of Health Education, Health Literacy and Health Education: Research and Practical
Applications contains three feature articles, five research articles and two commentaries.
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