[Common knowledge of protective health factors--a qualitative study]

The present study investigates what "laypersons" feel are the factors responsible for their own health and for maintaining health. In a partially structured interview everyday knowledge on positive health factors was examined in 41 healthy adults. An analysis of the subjective feelings on causes of personal invulnerability, on conditions which help one maintain one's health into the future, and on the resources one has to deal with critical events in life reveals how diverse and complex the everyday knowledge of those persons is. The knowledge about protective health factors is unfluenced by a biopsychosocial understanding of health. The majority of those interviewed assume that one can control one's psychological and physical health through one's own efforts or by using one's own resources.