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Article: Health literacy for improved health outcomes: effective capital in the marketplace.
- Article from:
- The Journal of Consumer Affairs
- Article date:
- June 22, 2009
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2009 American Council on Consumer Interests. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Improving consumers' health literacy addresses many of the rising problems in healthcare. We empirically support a reconceptualization of health literacy as a social and cultural practice through which adults leverage a range of skills as well as social networks to meet their needs. Pierre Bourdieu's "theory of practice" guides this reconceptualization and facilitates articulation of the array of strategies used in the complex healthcare marketplace. We focus on the low literate consumers' alternative forms of capital and the providers' recognition and support. The findings, from an emergent research design consisting of depth interviews with low literate consumers and ...