Closing the Breast Cancer Disparity Gap: An Exploratory Analysis of the Spiritual Well Being Scale (SWBS) and its Potential as a Health Promotion Tool among African American Women

Abstract

The strategic incorporation of spirituality in health promotion practice presents public health communicators with a unique opportunity to reach minority populations about cancer risk and prevention. The purpose of this study was to conduct confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) of the SWBS (Spiritual Well-Being Scale) and its associations with breast cancer screening attitudes, beliefs and mass mediated breast cancer screening information among a pilot sample of African American women in the Midwest (N = 98). CFA results supported the psychometric properties of the SWBS; all standardized factor loadings were statistically significant (p < 0.001) and substantially large (> 0.90). Hypotheses that spiritual well-being would predict breast cancer screening media exposure were not supported; participants who had higher levels of spiritual well-being were exposed to less information about breast cancer screening through the media. Consequently, the influences of the general spiritual well-being factor could not be mediated or delivered through the breast cancer screening media exposure factor to those outcome factors (i.e., no mediations). Although findings show that the SWBS did not predict breast cancer media exposure, the SWBS may be a useful tool in bolstering health promotion practice and inform research based on its domains (Religious Well Being and Existential Well Being). These domains capture individual-level factors that may impede or facilitate breast cancer screening in vulnerable populations.