Knowledge, misconceptions, self-efficacy and attitudes regarding HIV: Cross-cultural assessment and analysis in adolescents

HIV infection is an important worldwide problem where the number of infected people is still increasing. Adolescents are highly vulnerable to HIV infection. Moreover, there is a need of improvements in HIV prevention, especially in low and middle income countries. The aim of this study was to assess the level of knowledge, misconceptions, susceptibility, attitudes and self-efficacy regarding HIV/AIDS in Spanish, Colombian and Panamanian adolescents. A total of 10,130 adolescents aged between 13 and 18 years participated in this study. It is an ex post facto study, which was conducted with cross-sectional surveys. A stratified random sampling procedure was used. Results showed main effects of country on the variables analyzed and differences according to sex and age in each country. Compared to Colombia and Spain, Panama needs stronger HIV prevention efforts, as it had the highest scores in HIV misconceptions and negative attitudes towards HIV and the lowest scores in HIV correct knowledge.