Prediction of the Student's Intention to the Consumption of Soft Drinks: Using the Extended Parallel Process Model

Soft drinks consumption is a major world public health concern. This study investigates the factors which influence the students’ intention to consume fewer amounts of soft drinks, using The Extended Parallel Process Model.
This cross-sectional study was conducted on 320 high schools boys in Yazd, Iran (2014). A 15-item, 5-point Likert-type scale questionnaire was used to measure the participants’ perceived susceptibility, severity, response-efficacy and self-efficacy and intention about soft drinks’ consumption. Internal consistency (Cronbach alpha >0.7 for each construct) and external consistency: r = 0.79, P. =0.01) of questionnaire was approved. Data were analyzed by SPSS 16, using descriptive analysis, bivariate correlation, and stepwise multiple regression analysis. The level of significance was set at 0.05.
The participants’ average soft drink consumption was 3±3.4 daily glasses. Danger control processes had more frequency over fear control ones (57.7% vs. 42.3% of participants). The intention of fewer amounts soft drinks consumption was positively correlated with perceived response efficacy, self-efficacy and total efficacy. 16% of the participants’ intention variations were explained by self-efficacy. The odds of intention towards not to consume soft drinks were significantly higher for the high efficacy/ low threat category (OR=1.51, p= 0.04) compared with low efficacy / low threat category.
The results revealed that inducing fear is not an effective way to promote healthy drinking behavior and the choice of fear appeals is often a poor choice in this subject. It can be suggested that health educators should move from traditional threatening fear arousal messages to improving their target audience’s self-efficacy.