School-age children's understanding of the relations between their behavior and their asthma management

This research examined the behaviors children reported to be linked to their asthma flare-ups, the extent to which reported links were in the theoretically expected direction, explanatory models children gave for linkages they espoused, and the extent to which reporting a greater number of theoretically appropriate linkages was associated with a variety of asthma-related beliefs and behaviors. Most children reported that their behavior had an affect on their breathing and most often the reported impact was in theoretically expected directions (73%-100%). The ability of children to provide substantive explanatory models was more limited. Significant relationships were found between the child's number of theoretically appropriate affirmative responses and several subsequent measures of asthma knowledge, extent of child's responsibility to implement daily asthma management by both parent and child report, child's self-efficacy rating on his or her ability to perform asthma self-management activities, and the child's report of frequency with which routine asthma management behaviors were performed.