A b s t r a c t Objective:To introduce the Q-methodology research technique to the field of health informatics. Q-methodology -the systematic study of subjectivity -was used to identify and categorize the opinions of primary care physicians and medical students that contributed to our understanding of their reasons for acceptance of and/or resistance to adapting information technologies in the health care workplace.Design: Thirty-four physicians and 25 medical students from the Chicago area were surveyed and asked to rank-order 30 opinion statements about information technologies within the health care workplace. The Q-methodology research technique was employed to structure an opinion typology from their rank-ordered statements. (The rank-ordered sorts were subjected to correlation and by-person factor analysis to obtain groupings of participants who sorted the opinion statements into similar arrangements.) Results:The typology for this study revealed groupings of similar opinion-types associated with the likelihood of physicians and medical students to adapt information technology into their health care workplace. A typology of six opinions was identified in the following groups: (1) Full-Range Adopters; (2) Skills-Concerned Adopters; (3) Technology-Critical Adopters; (4) Independently-Minded and Concerned; (5) Inexperienced and Worried; and (6) Business-Minded and Adaptive. It is imperative to understand that in the application of Q-methodology, the domain is subjectivity and research is performed on small samples. The methodology is a combination of qualitative and quantitative research techniques that reveals dimensions of subjective phenomena from a perspective intrinsic to the individual to determine what is statistically different about the dimensions and to identify characteristics of individuals who share common viewpoints. Low response rates do not bias Q-methodology because the primary purpose is to identify a typology, not to test the typology's proportional distribution within the larger population.Conclusion: Q-methodology can allow for the simultaneous study of objective and subjective issues to determine an individual's opinion and forecast their likeliness to adapt information technologies in the health care workplace. This study suggests that an organization's system implementers could employ Q-methodology to individualize and customize their approach to understanding the personality complexities of physicians in their organization and their willingness to adapt and utilize information technologies within the workplace. In this study we introduce Q-methodology-a unique combination of qualitative and quantitative research techniques that permits the systematic study of subjectivity-to the field of health care informatics. 1Our purpose was to identify, categorize, and understand the opinions of Chicago-area primary care physicians and medical students regarding their acceptance of and/or resistance to adapting information technologies in the health care workplace.Although Q-methodology has been ...

The session provided a broad overview of current knowledge and progress in the field. Using the results of cross-sectional studies, Dietrich Kurz of Germany demonstrated associations between sport activity and personal attributes of psychosocial and physical health. Using the results of a longitudinal study, Wolf-Dietrich Brettschneider found that German sport clubs in and of themselves do not have significant effects on the development of psychosocial health in young people. In a Dutch longitudinal study, Willem van Mechelen found moderate tracking of biological cardiovascular risk factors and of physical fitness from adolescence into adulthood, as well as relationships between adolescent physical activity and both adult bone health and maximal aerobic power. Reporting on findings from U.S.-American school intervention program, Tom McKenzie demonstrated the importance of social contexts, physical opportunities for sport, mental motivation for healthy lifestyles, trainer and teacher development with continuous education, and innovative, cooperative arrangements between schools and communitybased agencies.

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