Community capacity for prevention and health promotion: a scoping review on underlying domains and assessment methods

Building community capacity is an essential health promotion approach, which refers to the characteristics of communities that affect their ability to identify and address social and public health problems. Despite general agreement about certain capacity domains and frameworks, there is no comprehensive and consistent assessment of community capacity. Therefore, the aim of this scoping review is to identify the domains and methods used to assess community capacity related to community-based prevention and health promotion.

A scoping search was performed on 06/02/2022 via PubMed, Web of Science, and Science Direct, with supplemental searches via Google Scholar. The review included studies published in English from 1990 to 2022 that explicitly described how community capacity was assessed in health promotion and prevention interventions. Furthermore, studies had to meet at least two of the three following criteria for capacity assessment: a theoretical foundation, a participatory approach, or a field test of the assessment tool.

From 4779 records, 38 studies were included after applying exclusion criteria. Nineteen studies used mixed, eleven qualitative and eight quantitative methods to assess community capacity. The various domains used to assess community capacity were identified and reassembled into nine comprehensive domains: community participation, knowledge and skills, resources, leadership, community power, sense of community, collaboration, critical awareness and problem-solving, and community structure. The review also identified four sub-domains, which include commitment, communication, shared values and goals, and sustainability.

This scoping review provides an overview of the domains and methods used to assess community capacity, which can facilitate the development of a comprehensive approach to capacity assessment in future research.