Abstract
Aim
To determine whether exposing children to images of positive dental care would have an effect on their degree of anxiety, assessing anxiety three separate times.Study design
Controlled trial.Methods
The 70 participants from 4-11 years of age were randomly assigned to one of two conditions. The intervention consisted of viewing positive images of dentistry and dental treatment (n=35). The control condition consisted of dentally neutral images (n=35).Outcome measures
Anxiety was assessed using the Venham Picture Test (VPT) prior to the intervention, immediately following the intervention and following the dental appointment.Statistics
Statistical analysis (chisquare and Mann-Whitney tests) was conducted blind to group allocation.Results
No significant difference was detected between the scores of the VPT in the two groups at any evaluation time (p>0.05). Dental anxiety at the three evaluation times was not correlated to age. There was no difference in level of anxiety between male and female participants (p>0.05).Conclusions
Viewing positive images of dentistry and dentists did not have a greater effect on child anxiety in the dental setting than viewing neutral images, however, showed lower rates of anxiety for all children although this was not significant.