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Effects of Patient-Provider Race Concordance and Smoking Status on Lung Cancer Risk Perception Accuracy Among African-Americans

  • Original Article
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Annals of Behavioral Medicine

Abstract

Background

Communication of lung cancer risk information between providers and African-American patients occurs in a context marked by race-based health disparities.

Purpose

A controlled experiment assessed whether perceived physician race influenced African-American patients’ (n = 127) risk perception accuracy following the provision of objective lung cancer risk information.

Methods

Participants interacted with a virtual reality-based, simulated physician who provided personalized cancer risk information.

Results

Participants who interacted with a racially discordant virtual doctor were less accurate in their risk perceptions at post-test than those who interacted with a concordant virtual doctor, F(1,94) = 4.02, p = .048. This effect was amplified among current smokers. Effects were not mediated by trust in the provider, engagement with the health care system, or attention during the encounter.

Conclusions

The current study demonstrates that African-American patients’ perceptions of a doctor’s race are sufficient to independently impact their processing of lung cancer risk information.

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by the Intramural Research Program of the National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health. The authors thank Collette Eccleston, Paul Han, and Colleen McBride for their insightful comments on an earlier version of this paper, and Isaac Lipkus and Ellen Peters for their valuable advice. The authors also thank Christina Lachance, Jalia Tucker, Wafa Khradouri, and Sabrina Mathenia for assistance with project preparation and data collection.

Conflict of Interest

The authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Social and Behavioral Research Branch, National Human Genome Research Institute, 31 Center Drive, Rm. B1B36, Bethesda, MD, 20892, USA

    Susan Persky PhD

  2. Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, USA

    Kimberly A. Kaphingst ScD

  3. University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Vincent C. Allen Jr. MA

  4. Zirve University, Gaziantep, Turkey

    Ibrahim Senay PhD

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  1. Susan Persky PhD
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  2. Kimberly A. Kaphingst ScD
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  3. Vincent C. Allen Jr. MA
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Correspondence to Susan Persky PhD.

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Persky, S., Kaphingst, K.A., Allen, V.C. et al. Effects of Patient-Provider Race Concordance and Smoking Status on Lung Cancer Risk Perception Accuracy Among African-Americans. ann. behav. med. 45, 308–317 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12160-013-9475-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12160-013-9475-9

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