Encouraging Family Discussion on the Decision to Donate Organs: The Role of the Willingness to Communicate Scale

Abstract

Family discussion of organ donation has been found to double rates of family consent regarding organ donation. Therefore, family discussion is an important communication process to study in the effort to get more people to become organ donors. This investigation concerns the willingness to communicate about organ donation and its relationship to other variables and processes related to family discussion of organ donation. Previous research on willingness to communicate examined the antecedent variables of knowledge, attitude toward organ donation, and altruism. This research found that being willing to communicate about organ donation with one's family is related to prior thought and intent to sign an organ donor card, to perceiving organ donation messages as credible, and to feeling relatively low anxiety after reading organ donation messages. One week after being presented with the messages, willingness to communicate was found to be positively associated with worrying about the lack of donors, engaging in family discussion about organ donation, and having an organ donor card witnessed. It was negatively related to feeling personally uneasy about organ donation during the past week.

Pediatric organ donation: What factors most influence parents??? donation decisions?*

“…19 Public education campaigns should continue to encourage people to become organ donors and to discuss this decision with all family members, including older children and adolescents. 20, 21 We also found that print media coverage of transplant success stories was an important and effective strategy for increasing awareness of the benefits of both organ donation and transplantation, especially in donor parents. Newspaper and magazine articles that stress how donated organs made the triumph of transplantation possible would seem to have a particularly positive impact.…”

Kadavradan Organ Bağışında Aile Algısı ve İletişim

“…Aynı çalışmada eğer ölen kişi gençse ve bağışı yapacak olan kişi anne-babası değil de, kardeşi ya da çocukları ise bağış izninin azaldığı saptanmıştır. Ölüm bir hastalık nedeniyle değil de bir şiddet olayı sonucu (intihar hariç) gerçekleşmişse ölen kişiye daha fazla acı çektirilmemesi düşüncesiyle yine bağış izninin azaldığı tespit edilmiştir (24).…”

Exploring Subtext Processing in Narrative Persuasion: The Role of Eudaimonic Entertainment-Use Motivation and a Supplemental Conclusion Scene

“…Willingness to Communicate About Organ Donation Scale (developed by Morgan & Miller, 2002, extended by Smith et al, 2004). The scale measures the extent participants agree with statements related to discussing organ donation with other people on a seven-point scale (0 = Disagree Strongly; 6 = Agree Strongly).…”

“…• I feel proud about my decision to donate • I would recommend the decision to become an organ donor to other people • I always want to be registered as an organ donor • I would not advise someone else to register as an organ donor (R) • I regret my decision to donate (R) • I feel very committed to my decision to become an organ donor Willingness to Communicate (Morgan & Miller, 2002;Smith et al, 2004) (0 = Disagree Strongly; 6 = Agree Strongly)…”