Does Mother Know Best? An Actor-Partner Model of College-Age Women's Human Papillomavirus Vaccination Behavior

This study examined the associations of perceived threat, perceived efficacy, and parent-child communication with the extent to which college-age women received the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine. Daughters and their mothers completed a survey about the HPV vaccine (N = 182 dyads). The results showed that mothers' perceived self-efficacy to talk to their daughters and mothers' response efficacy of the vaccine were indirectly related to mother-daughter communication about HPV. Further, mother-daughter communication mediated the relation between mothers' intention to talk to their daughters and daughters' HPV vaccination behavior. This study demonstrates the importance of the social context of health behavior and the role of communication in understanding maternal influence on the HPV vaccination behavior of young adult women. (Contains 3 tables and 1 figure.)