Cognitive Factors in Health Care

The papers in this special issue all describe studies that are both theoretically guided and address critical problems of broad significance for health care. Consistent with the aims of this journal, each study is a theoretically guided investigation of an applied problem. By managing the tension between theory and application, the studies identify the important problems of patient safety as well as the contextual and practitioner factors that contribute to these problems, and help develop solutions that address them. Collectively the studies address a wide range of important patient safety problems such as provider error in inpatient settings related to diagnosis, medication administration, and surgery, as well as patient-related problems in outpatient settings, such as comprehension and decision-making related to illness prevention and self-care.