Islamic boarding schools (pesantren) are Islamic-based educational institutions with a boarding school system, where students and teachers live in the same neighborhood and tend to be closed community. The number of pesantren in Indonesia is around 27,230 with majority in Java (78.6%) with a total student population reaching 3.8 million.
Based on a preliminary study conducted by Al-Yasini Islamic boarding school, Pasuruan, East Java, it was found that 27 students out of 30 students had cavities with a high DMF-T score at 4.6 which means that around 90% of students had poor dental health status. The oral dental health status is inseparable from the behavior and environment among students.
People behavior can be assessed using Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) or known as the socio-psychological model. Based on this theory there are subjective norm variables to predict the influence of the people closest to the environment around certain individual behaviors.
Pesantren education not only uses academic and religious studies but also character education, such as maintaining personal hygiene is part of health behavior. And the norm that applies to the boarding school environment is compliance and a high level of trust from students to teachers.
This is what inspired a research team of Universitas Airlangga to conduct this research. This study aims to analyze the role of students’ commitment in predicting behavior to maintain oral health based on Theory of Planned Behavior.
Basically, the pesantren environment is an environment with certain rules and facilities, so that students can perform oral hygiene behavior with maximum facilities, while the constraints to oral hygiene behavior are minimal. Then based on research, it turns out subjective norms, characteristics and knowledge of students are significant for a commitment to maintain oral health.
With this research, greater role of teachers is expected in the pesantren environment as a role model for students in maintaining health, especially oral health. This is to reduce the incidence of dental and oral health problems in students.
Author: Dr. Taufan Bramantoro
Reference: Bramantoro, T. Basiroh, E. Berniyanti, T. Setijanto, RD Irmalia, WR Intention and Oral Health Behavior Perspective of Islamic Traditional Boarding School Students Based on Theory of Planned Behavior. Pesquisa Brasileira em Odontopediatria e Clínica Integrada 2020; 20: e497
http://revista.uepb.edu.br/index.php/pboci/article/download/4977/pdf
