Soliciting Social Support from Migrant Domestic Workers' Connections to Storytelling Networks during a Public Health Crisis.

Guided by communication infrastructure theory and social support theory, this study scrutinizes how the storytelling networks of marginalized communities, particularly migrant domestic workers (MDWs), provided social support amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Data obtained from in-depth interviews with 32 Indonesian MDWs in Hong Kong revealed that the community storytelling networks, comprising interpersonal relationships, community organizations, and media outlets, played an essential role in assisting the coping efforts of MDWs during the pandemic. These storytelling networks offered various types of social support, including informational, emotional, and instrumental or tangible assistance. However, these connections to the storytelling networks were also sources of the spread of misinformation. Theoretical and practical implications are further discussed.

Resistance to Masks During the COVID-19 Pandemic: How User Comments Drive Psychological Reactance to Health Campaigns.

Campaigns for mask-wearing have become widespread on digital platforms during the COVID-19 outbreak and have garnered varied responses in the form of comments. The present study conducts a 2 (comment position: pro-mask wearing vs. anti-mask wearing) × 2 (comment tone: civil vs. uncivil) between-subjects experiment to investigate whether and how the position and tone of comments accompanying a health campaign on social media affect people's psychological reactance toward the campaign. The results show that although anti-mask wearing comments following a social media mask-promoting post provoke individuals' perception about others' disapproval of the post, the perception did not trigger the individuals' psychological reactance to the post. Nevertheless, uncivil comments elicit anger, which arouses reactance and cause persuasion failure.

Understanding Health Information Behaviors of Migrant Domestic Workers during the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Migrant domestic workers (MDWs) in Hong Kong remain vulnerable during the COVID-19 pandemic. Obtaining accurate information is essential for MDWs as it helps them understand their predicament and protect themselves. Therefore, this study delves into the MDWs' health literacy by scrutinizing how they acquire, verify, and respond to pandemic-related information. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 32 Indonesian MDWs, recruited through purposive and snowball sampling. The data were examined using a constant comparative approach in grounded theory. The findings reveal that the participants engaged in information seeking and scanning to obtain health crisis information, mainly through their friends, family members, and community organizations. The participants also verified the information using their judgment or by consulting other actors, such as local organizations and media outlets. The messages they obtained informed the means to protect themselves, which motivated them to adopt preventive measures. However, some also engaged in maladaptive coping, such as taking ineffective preventive actions. The participants also disseminated health crisis information throughout their social circle. This study concluded that MDWs performed four health information behaviors during the pandemic, namely information acquisition, authentication, sharing, and adoption of preventive measures. However, their information practices may change at different stages of the pandemic.

The Battle is On: Factors that Motivate People to Combat Anti-Vaccine Misinformation.

This study proposes a theory-driven model to concurrently examine the cognitive and emotional factors that motivate vaccine supporters to combat erroneous online anti-vaccination information. The model was tested using data from a web survey of 599 vaccination supporters in the United States. The vaccine supporters reported greater support for government regulation of misinformation when they perceived greater susceptibility among the general public to the influence of misinformation. Surprisingly, the perceived severity of the influence was inversely related to respondents' intention to correct misinformation. In addition, perceived susceptibility to the influence of anti-vaccine misinformation and perceived severity of its influence on others induced negative emotions that included anticipated guilt and anger. The negative emotions in turn motivate vaccine supporters to attitudinally support government's media restriction or behaviorally correct the online misinformation.

The Role of Influence of Presumed Influence and Anticipated Guilt in Evoking Social Correction of COVID-19 Misinformation.

Misinformation on social media pertaining to COVID-19 poses a great threat to public health. The active correction of misinformation by social media users and an understanding of the drivers of such behavior can help solve this ongoing issue. Drawing on the influence of presumed influence model and cognitive appraisal theory, an online experiment (N = 400) was conducted to examine how exposure to corrective messages with regard to COVID-19 misinformation induced individuals' threat appraisals of the influence of the misinformation on others and how these threat appraisals and the corresponding emotional responses motivated individuals to take corrective actions. The results suggested that people's perceptions of the severity of the influence of misinformation on others engendered anticipated guilt, which, in turn, strengthened their intentions to correct misinformation related to COVID-19. The study offers guidance on how to effectively craft a corrective message to encourage audiences to counter misinformation together.