Individual and collective empowerment and associated factors among Brazilian adults: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

BackgroundThe empowerment embedded in the health area is defined as a process that can facilitate control over the determinants of health of individuals and population as a way to improve health. The aim of this study was to verify the association between individual and collective empowerment with sociodemographic conditions, lifestyle, health conditions and quality of life.MethodA cross-sectional analytical study was conducted with 1150 individuals (aged 35 to 44 years). The empowerment was determined by questions from the Integrated Questionnaire for the Measurement of Social Capital (IQ-MSC). The quality of life was measured using the WHOQOL (World Health Organization Quality of Life-Bref). Lifestyle and health conditions were obtained by adapted questions from the Fantastic Lifestyle Questionnaire The DMFT Index was incorporated in the health conditions questions. Logistic regression or multinomial regression was performed.ResultsThe practice of physical activity was related to individual (OR: 2.70) and collective (OR: 1.57) empowerment. Regarding individual empowerment, people with higher education level (5–11 years – OR: 3.46 and ≥12 years – OR: 4.41), who felt more able to deal with stress (OR:3.76), who presented a high score on quality of life (psychological domain) (OR:1.23) and that smoked (OR:1.49) were more likely to feel able to make decisions and participate in community activities. The increase in the DMFT Index represented less chance of individuals to feel more able to make decisions (OR: 0.96). Regarding the collective empowerment, being religious (catholic) (OR: 1.82), do not drink or drink just a little (OR: 1.66 and 2.28, respectively), and increased score of overall quality of life (OR: 1.08) were more likely to report that people cooperate to solve a problem in their community.ConclusionThe two approaches to empowerment, the individual and collective are connected, and the physical activity showed to be a good strategy for the empowerment construction.

Basque Ethnic Identity and Collective Empowerment: Two Key Factors in Well-Being and Community Participation

“…Prior studies have shown that both self-efficacy and perceived collective efficacy may be related, and that both are associated with greater psychological well-being, self-esteem, life satisfaction, better stress management (Bandura, 1997;Devonport and Lane, 2006;Siu et al, 2007;Viel-Ruma et al, 2010;Çalik et al, 2012;Roos et al, 2013) and intense positive emotions (Zumeta et al, 2020). In turn, the study by Soares et al (2015) showed that individual empowerment was also related to collective empowerment, and that both of them were associated with higher quality of life and better stress management. However, while individual empowerment was only associated with the psychological aspect of quality of life (e.g., selfesteem, body image and physical appearance, feelings), collective empowerment was associated with all aspects of quality of life, both in psychological, as well as physical, social and environment terms.…”

“…Indeed, some studies (e.g., Molix and Bettencourt, 2010;Lardier et al, 2018) have shown that synergy or interaction between ethnic identity and psychological or individual empowerment can contribute to both well-being and to community participation. Notwithstanding, there are other collective factors, such as collective psychological empowerment (CPE) (Drury and Reicher, 2009) that may contribute to well-being and community participation, but that have been less investigated (Staples, 1990;Soares et al, 2015). However, neglecting the role that this sort of social variable plays in the study of well-being may lead to lower awareness of its function and, therefore, lower capacity to develop individuals and societies with greater degrees of well-being.…”

Health-related quality of life and determinants in North-China urban community residents

“…This is consistent with the findings by Song et al [6] among urban community residents in an industrial city located in the northeast of China. Smoking and drinking has been consistently accepted as risk factors for many chronic diseases but are rarely correlated with HRQoL [27,28]. However, bearing in mind the adverse effects of these behaviors on health and the significant correlation of bad health and poor HRQoL, smoking cessation and alcohol abstinence should continually be advocated as part of public health education.…”

Factors associated with a fantastic lifestyle in Brazilian college students - a multilevel analysis

“…Health promotion is seen as the main strategy for the reduction of morbidity and mortality, reinforcing actions on people's LS, since many diseases (e.g., hypertension, diabetes, cancer) are consequences of harmful behaviors, such as stress, inadequate feeding, and consumption of psychoactive substances 3 , and a significant percentage of non-communicable diseases could thus be avoided 4 . Nevertheless, LS has no particular definition, it is related to habits, and it can be influenced by or developed during daily work or study activities 5 .…”

“…Having religious beliefs and a healthy behavior has been shown to be an individual empowerment factor 3 . Although this was not within the scope of our study, our findings are in agreement with other authors, since being a religious person interferes positively in the FANATASTIC lifestyle of university students (p <0.001).…”