Does Organizational Messaging Make a Difference? Investigating Themes and Language Style in Twitter Discourse and Engagement by Mental Health Organizations.

The present study investigated the latent topics and language styles present in mental health organizational discourse on Twitter. The researchers sought to analyze identifying the prevalence of and language used in social support messaging in tweets about mental health care, the overarching topics regarding mental health care, and predicted that tweets with higher engagement will have increased frequency of words with positively valenced emotion and cognitive processing. A GSDMM was run to uncover latent themes that emerged in a data set of 326.9k tweets and 7.2 m words about organizational discussions of mental health. A generalized linear model using the Poisson distribution was used to assess the role of engagement, positive emotion, and cognitive processing. The study found support for both positive emotion and cognitive processing as statistically significant predictors of engagement. Directions for research include the development of health message strategies, policy needs, and online interventions.

Social Media as Risk-Attenuation and Misinformation-Amplification Station: How Social Media Interaction Affects Misperceptions about COVID-19.

This study addresses how social media interaction affects misperceptions about COVID-19 via risk perceptions thereof and whether political orientation moderates the relationship. Using original two-wave panel survey data (N = 679), this study reveals that social media interaction increases misperception directly, as well as indirectly by reducing the extent of risk perception. The extent of risk perception is found to be a negative predictor of misperception. The deleterious role of social media interaction on misperception is pronounced across groups of conservatives and liberals, but in different ways. Although the effects of social media interaction on the level of misperception are observed in both conservatives and liberals, this relationship is particularly salient among conservatives. Furthermore, whereas conservatives consistently show low levels of risk perception toward COVID-19 regardless of how much they interact with others on social media, the more liberals interact on social media, the less likely they are to perceive COVID-19-related risks. The findings expand our understanding of the role of interaction behaviors on social media in forming risk perceptions and misperceptions on the politicized COVID-19 pandemic.

Communication Expressed on the COVID-19 Subreddit in the Midst of a Global Pandemic.

The manner in which scientific information related to the COVID-19 pandemic has been shared and discussed in similar venues has, to date, been largely neglected. Considering the role that such discourse plays in knowledge sharing and knowledge production, it is essential to understand such communication processes as they relate to global health crises like the COVID-19 pandemic. The current study examines communication expressed by participants in the r/COVID19 subreddit, a community that facilitates scientific discussion of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. A computational content analysis was performed to identify the primary themes of users' communication on r/COVID19, while stepwise segmented regression was used to assess identify longitudinal changes in the volume of user contributions. Findings showed that while conversations were centered on scientific conversations, they were catalyzed by sociological and political developments rather than scientific breakthroughs. Future studies should examine the effects of pandemic-related communities on lurkers, the effects of visibility on scientific and medical contributions, and the implications of pseudonymity and ambiguous credentials in a community addressing a volatile health and scientific topic.

Finding the Invisible Leader: When A Priori Opinion Leader Identification is Impossible.

Opinion leaders are increasingly recruited to diffuse information, attitudes, and behaviors to serve communication campaigns. However, this has historically required opinion leader identification before launching the campaign. A priori identification is impossible in many contexts, such as when addressing unfamiliar topics or insular communities. The authors introduce a two-stage campaign approach that resolves this problem, and a public health campaign is used to demonstrate it. This approach is applicable to a wider variety of contexts than traditional a priori opinion leader identification.

Oral Healthcare Implications of Dedicated Online Communities: A Computational Content Analysis of the r/Dentistry Subreddit.

The current study explores communication expressed by participants in a subreddit surrounding oral health care, moderated by dentists and dental hygienists. The corpus was analyzed through Leximancer, a computer-assisted program used for computational content analyses of large data sets. Users' personal disclosures about ongoing dental concerns, advice about others' self-care, and the role of interpersonal communication with and among health care providers emerged as dominant themes. The findings suggest that online communities may serve an important role that dentists are unable to fill in their limited interactions with individual patients. Such interaction spaces may therefore offer a fertile environment for future interventions to promote beneficial practices and achieve positive health-related outcomes.

"Sharing Hope and Healing": A Culturally Tailored Social Media Campaign to Promote Living Kidney Donation and Transplantation Among Native Americans.

In this article, the authors discuss a community-based participatory research (CBPR)-driven and culturally tailored social media campaign to promote living kidney donation and transplantation (LKDT) serving Native American communities, who are disproportionately burdened by kidney failure. The effort represents a collaboration among researchers, tribal leaders and community members, medical centers, and other stakeholders to facilitate health promotion related to LKDT among the broader Native American community. Campaign objectives were collaboratively established by the researchers and stakeholders, and the campaign approach and materials were likewise developed in consultation with the community. The results indicated that the use of success stories about LKDT within campaign materials was a statistically significant predictors of heightened campaign engagement (p = .003, ß = .223). Recommendations are offered for partnering with tribal communities and other stakeholders, as well as for building tailored health promotion strategies.

Native Americans' Memorable Conversations About Living Kidney Donation and Transplant.

Living kidney donation and transplant (LKDT) offers a path of hope for patients on indefinite dialysis treatment. However, identification of a living donor can be challenging; initiating these conversations is difficult. Our study analyzes memorable conversations about LKDT that occurred in response to an LKDT campaign targeted to Native Americans. Our analysis of n = 28 memorable conversations revealed that the campaign prompted conversations and increased communication efficacy about LKDT. Based on these findings, we suggest that campaign designers utilize narratives within campaigns to model communication self-efficacy and then analyze the content of postcampaign conversations as an indicator of campaign effectiveness.

Behavioral determinants for vaccine acceptability among rurally located college students.

Background: College-aged adults in a rural and medically-underserved area often struggle to receive proper vaccinations due to lower socioeconomic status coupled with life demands. Objectives: The Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) was used as the theoretical basis to explore behavioral determinants associated with vaccination uptake in the population. Methods: This study used a questionnaire distributed to college students (n = 208) located in a rural area to assess the effects of social and behavioral factors on vaccination uptake. Results: Attitudes and normative beliefs towards vaccination uptake were positive but were largely impacted by work demands. Perceived behavioral control did not contribute towards the intent to receive necessary vaccines. Conclusions: Researchers conducting vaccination interventions, along with physician-patient communication, need to target attitudes and subjective norms in rural and medically underserved communities to increase vaccines, particularly HPV. In addition, results showed that promoting vaccine uptake among minorities is necessary to aid in vaccine acceptability in these communities.

Online Social Support for Participants of Crohn's and Ulcerative Colitis Groups.

Thousands of people affected by or caring for someone affected by Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis participate in online social support groups today. The diseases, which are often discussed in conjunction due to being similar in nature, have no cure and yet affect over 1 million people in the United States alone. There is a need for health communication scholarship to examine the nature of the messages in Crohn's and UC groups, which can lend insight into the unique struggles and psychosocial benefits that members gain from group participation. To develop an in-depth understanding of social support exchanges on these groups, 2000 posts within a 2-year period were randomly selected and content analyzed. Using a taxonomy of social support, several categories and subcategories of social support emerged. Results showed that informational support (41.1%) and emotional support (36.1%) were most frequently exchanged, followed by esteem support (14.3%) and network support (14.2%). Data suggested that several exchanges, such as symptom management and remission, experiences of extraintestinal manifestations, and relational support, may be contextually unique due to the variety of symptoms and treatments unique to Crohn's and UC. Recommendations are provided for researchers to collaborate with health practitioners and educators, including developing interventions and patient-centered practices to better serve patients and caregivers of Crohn's and UC. Further avenues for research in social support are also recommended.

Theoretical implications addressing rural college students' organ donation behaviors.

The current study used the theory of planned behavior to examine rural college students' attitudes, normative beliefs, and perceived behavioral control regarding intent to register as organ donors. This effort is done in light of a need to increase intervention efforts among college students, particularly those in rural areas where these undertakings may need to be tailored in grassroots approaches. The study made use of perceived behavioral control as a moderator and found partial support for the model. Findings offer results that scholars, practitioners, and educators can utilize for interventions.