Journal Article

Health literacy level and its influencing factors among college students majoring in sports : a cross-sectional study

Yin, Yue, Min, Zhu, Fang, Qiang, Liu, Ting

2025

Overview

Objective To understand the 2024 health-literacy level of college students majoring in sports in China—covering the three dimensions of basic knowledge and beliefs, healthy lifestyles and behaviors, and fundamental health skills, as well as the six domains of scientific health perspectives, communicable disease prevention, chronic disease prevention, safety and first aid, basic medical care, and health-information literacy—and to identify their determinants, to guide the development of tailored, evidence-based health-literacy interventions for undergraduate sport science students in China. Methods Using stratified random cluster sampling, 1083 college students majoring in sports were selected from six universities in Jiangsu Province. The questionnaire was divided into two parts: the basic situation of the study population and health literacy; the basic situation included general demographic characteristics, lifestyle status, and family-related information; the health literacy level of sports major college students was investigated using the “ National Public Health Literacy Monitoring Survey Questionnaire .” It is included three aspects of health literacy and six categories of health problems. The required statistical analyses were performed using Chi-square tests and Gamma correlation analysis in SPSS 26.0 software. Binary logistic regression was applied to identify significant predictors. Results Among 1,083 participants (69.44% male, 30.56% female), overall health-literacy level was 31.49%. The knowledge dimension scored highest (45.52%), basic skills lowest (26.69%); among six domains, safety and first-aid ranked highest (58.36%) and basic medical care lowest (8.03%). Binary logistic regression showed that smoking (including e-cigarettes) (OR = 0.538), engaging in Extracurricular Exercis daily (OR = 0.338) and never attending health lectures (OR = 0.532)were associated with lower health-literacy, and higher literacy was observed among first-year students (OR = 1.093), those whose mothers held junior-college diplomas (OR = 1.617), students exercising 30 ~ 60 min per session (OR = 1.525). Conclusion This study, based on a cross-sectional study of over one thousand sports-major students, confirms that their overall health literacy averages only 31.49%. Specifically,“basic health skills\"and “basic medical care\"literacy both fall below 30%, emerging as the weakest domains. Binary logistic regression further identifies smoking, sophomore–junior students, and high-frequency exercise as key risk factors. By offering the first tracking of sports-major students’ health literacy and pinpointing precise intervention targets, the research fills an important evidence gap and provides an empirical foundation for tailored interventions. We recommend integrating tobacco-control education into the curriculum of sports majors, conducting continuous health literacy monitoring for sophomore–junior students, enhancing sport-specific skills, as well as exploring the mysteries of health with students through the application scenarios of health education theories and skills.

• Publisher: BioMed Central,BioMed Central Ltd,Springer Nature B.V,BMC
• Subject: Adolescent / Adult / Biostatistics / Chi-square test / China / Cigarettes / Clinical outcomes / College students / College students majoring in sports / Colleges & universities / Correlation analysis / Cross-Sectional Studies / Cross-sectional study / Curricula / Disease prevention / Education / Educational aspects / Environmental Health / Epidemiology / evidence-based strategies for active lifestyles / Female / First aid / Health care / Health education / Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice / Health literacy / Health Literacy - statistics & numerical data / Health literacy level / Health problems / Health services / Humans / Influencing factors / Information literacy / Male / Medicine / Medicine & Public Health / Multiple choice / opportunities / Physical education / Physical education and training / Population / Population studies / Promoting physical activity: challenges / Public Health / Questionnaires / Regression / Risk factors / Sample size / Schools / Skills / Smoking / Sports - statistics & numerical data / Sports sciences / Statistical analysis / Students / Students - psychology / Students - statistics & numerical data / Study and teaching / Surveys / Surveys and Questionnaires / Telemedicine / Tobacco / Universities / Vaccine / Young Adult