Promoting Health Equity And Population Health: How Americans' Views Differ

To increase understanding of what Americans think about personal and public health, a national survey of US adults was conducted in 2015-16 to develop a typology of values and beliefs. The survey was commissioned by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation for its Culture of Health initiative. Six specific population groupings, or segments, were identified. Three segments included people who supported an active government role in health, two segments were characterized by people who were skeptical toward government, and one segment was characterized by people with conflicted attitudes toward government in health. One of the segments, labeled "supportive," included people who had broad concerns about equity and social solidarity and believed in health disparities and the importance of the social determinants of health. People in two of the other segments that supported an active government role in health shared some of these concerns. There is clearly the potential to mobilize all three of these segments in efforts to improve population health and health equity in the United States. For people whose beliefs put them in the more skeptical segments, a focus on building healthier communities at the local level may garner significant support as long as there is private-sector leadership for the effort.