Lay perspectives on oral hygiene performance: their use in hypothesis development

This paper examines issues related to oral hygiene performance. Results from interviews with 113 adults who had received oral hygiene instruction in eight general dental practices are presented with an emphasis on three issues--the respondents' tooth cleaning pattern (the location within other routines of tooth cleaning), the respondents' tooth cleaning structure (the range of items used in tooth cleaning) and the reported content of the oral hygiene instruction given. Respondents reported that the oral hygiene instruction concentrated upon issues of tooth cleaning structure and did not consider issues of tooth cleaning pattern. The two variables (structure and pattern) were cross-tabulated to create an hypothesis to explain individual variation in tooth cleaning performance. The implications of this hypothesis for understanding patient compliance and developing further quantitative investigations are described.