Abstract

Due to the rapid development of technology and transportations, the number of international students pursuing tertiary education in developed countries is increasing dramatically. These international students move from different countries to developed countries, such as America, Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom. This paper reports a study which investigated international students’ views on of the conceptual and functional aspects health literacy. This study involved the participation of 45 international students from different language and cultural backgrounds. All these participants completed an online survey, while seven of them attended semi-structured interviews. At the time the research was conducted, these students were studying in different faculties/disciplines at the University of Tasmania, Australia. Using data from semi-interviews and questionnaires, the findings of this study showed that demographic factors such as cultural background, educational background, and English level are influential to international students’ health literacy. However, there is no finding indicating the occurrence of unawareness of health literacy among these participants. Some recommendations and suggestions deprived from the whole study are also presented.