ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: This study tested the relative efficacy of a culturally tailored dramatic narrative promoting COVID-19 vaccination in changing attitudes and behavioral intent among unvaccinated Latinas compared to a nonnarrative control containing similar information. DESIGN: A pretest-posttest experimental study with unvaccinated Latinas randomly assigned to watch either a dramatic narrative featuring Latina characters countering prevalent myths about COVID-19 vaccines or a nonnarrative film containing similar information (control condition). SETTING: The experiment was hosted online with the films embedded in the survey. PARTICIPANTS: Three-hundred-ninety adult Latinas living in the United States (mean age = 33.4 years; SD = 11.2) who had not been vaccinated against COVID-19 despite being eligible. At pretest, 57.7% were hesitant and 42.3% were resistant (refusing) to get vaccinated. MEASURES: Self-reported measures of engagement with the film, COVID-19 vaccine attitudes, and intent to get vaccinated within 30 days at pretest and posttest. RESULTS: Resistant women were significantly more engaged in the dramatic narrative than the nonnarrative control film (P = .03). Being engaged in a film predicted more positive post-viewing attitudes toward the vaccine (b = .28; P < .001) and higher intent to get vaccinated (b = 2.34, P < .001). CONCLUSION: Using culturally tailored stories to promote healthy behaviors such as vaccination can be an effective way of reaching resistant audiences.
ABSTRACT
This mixed-methods study analyzed English language US-based Twitter posts related to e-cigarette use from February 2021. Posts were manually identified as health-related or not, and if health-related, whether they were posted by an e-cigarette user. A random selection of 1,000 health-related tweets from 986 unique e-cigarette users were qualitatively content-analyzed for theory of planned behavior (TPB) constructs, as well as nature and tone of each tweet message. Using quantitative semantic network analysis, relationships among the identified topics and sentiment-specific conversation patterns were explored. The most salient health-related conversation topics of e-cigarette users, health beliefs corresponding to each TPB construct, and major motivational contexts of e-cigarette use were identified. Seven topics emerged in positive tweets: smoking cessation, social impact generation, controls over addiction, therapeutic effects on physical and mental health, social support, device attachment, and peer influence. Nine topics emerged in negative tweets: side effects on physical health, vaping addiction, lack of e-cigarette regulations, peer pressure, increased risk of COVID-19, side effects on mental health, no help in smoking cessation, social conflict, and polysubstance use. Most assertions for e-cigarette benefits were not substantiated. Jokes in tweets appeared to contribute to the view of vaping as an attractive, enjoyable, safe, and fun activity. Discussions about positive aspects of e-cigarette use were concentrated on a few related topics, while tweets discouraging e-cigarette use presented a diverse, less related topics. The results provide insights into drivers of e-cigarette use behaviors. E-cigarette user perspectives gathered from social media may inform research to guide future prevention and cessation interventions.
ABSTRACT
Amid the COVID-19 global pandemic, a highly troublesome influx of viral misinformation threatens to exacerbate the crisis through its deleterious effects on public health outcomes and health behavior decisions.This "misinfodemic" has ignited a surge of ongoing research aimed at characterizing its content, identifying its sources, and documenting its effects. Noticeably absent as of yet is a cogent strategy to disrupt misinformation.We start with the premise that the diffusion and persistence of COVID-19 misinformation are networked phenomena that require network interventions. To this end, we propose five classes of social network intervention to provide a roadmap of opportunities for disrupting misinformation dynamics during a global health crisis. Collectively, these strategies identify five distinct yet interdependent features of information environments that present viable opportunities for interventions.