The effect of risk communication on the nurses' task and contextual performance in disease outbreak control in Ghana: Application of the cause model

Summary Background The re‐emerging of infectious disease outbreaks is a menace in Ghana. As the acceptance of risk communication rises, health workers are using it to control outbreaks. Yet, research in risk communication and health workers' performance remains unexplored in Ghana. Objective This study explores how risk communication works among nurses and its effect on their task (behaviors that are delineated based on role requirements and identified by a thorough analysis of the job) and contextual performance (behaviors that do not fall within the employee's assigned duties, but are a very important part of job performance). Thus, we adopted the CAUSE model, which proposes that effective risk communication creates five goals (Confidence, Awareness, Understanding, Satisfaction, and Enactment) amongst communicators. Method This study involves a quantitative approach complemented with qualitative data. It was conducted in three hospitals in Ghana, from which a sample of 398 nurses were selected. Result The result depicts that risk communication has a significant and positive effect on task performance ( β = .65; P  < .001), and contextual performance ( β = .55; P  < .001). Conclusion Our study shows that confidence is the strongest predictor of risk communication in influencing task and contextual performance. Yet, risk communication overall improves nurses' task and contextual performance.