Shared decision‐making behaviours in health professionals: a systematic review of studies based on the Theory of Planned Behaviour

BACKGROUND Shared decision making (SDM) requires health professionals to change their practice. Socio-cognitive theories, such as the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB), provide the needed theoretical underpinnings for designing behaviour change interventions. OBJECTIVE We systematically reviewed studies that used the TPB to assess SDM behaviours in health professionals to explore how theory is being used to explain influences on SDM intentions and/or behaviours, and which construct is identified as most influential. SEARCH STRATEGY We searched PsycINFO, MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, Index to theses, Proquest dissertations and Current Contents for all years up to April 2012. INCLUSION CRITERIA We included all studies in French or English that used the TPB and related socio-cognitive theories to assess SDM behavioural intentions or behaviours in health professionals. We used Makoul & Clayman's integrative SDM model to identify SDM behaviours. DATA EXTRACTION AND SYNTHESIS We extracted study characteristics, nature of the socio-cognitive theory, SDM behaviour, and theory-based determinants of the SDM behavioural intention or behaviour. We computed simple frequency counts. MAIN RESULTS Of 12,388 titles, we assessed 136 full-text articles for eligibility. We kept 20 eligible studies, all published in English between 1996 and 2012. Studies were conducted in Canada (n = 8), the USA (n = 6), the Netherlands (n = 3), the United Kingdom (n = 2) and Australia (n = 1). The determinant most frequently and significantly associated with intention was the subjective norm (n = 15/21 analyses). DISCUSSION There was great variance in the way socio-cognitive theories predicted SDM intention and/or behaviour, but frequency of significance indicated that subjective norm was most influential.