April 7-9, 2022 • Hyatt Regency • Lexington, KY
Communication Strategies to Promote Comprehensive Well-being
Communication Strategies to Promote Comprehensive Well-being
Abstract: A Descriptive Analysis of Online Information Seeking for Environmental Health Risk Information
Background: Information seeking refers to specific actions and/or strategies used by individuals to acquire information about their health, usually within the context of coping with a health threat or when making a health behavior change (Lambert & Loiselle, 2007). Information seeking is an important predictor of health-related knowledge, beliefs, attitudes, behavioral intentions, and behaviors (Bigsby & Hovick, 2018; Kontos et al., 2007; Shim et al., 2006). However, most research on the process of health information seeking is based on self-reports of intended or past seeking. Only a handful of communication studies examined information seeking in real-time (Hovick et al., 2021; Myrick, 2017; So et al., 2019). We build on prior research by providing a descriptive analysis of individuals’ real-time, online information seeking about environmental risks. Method: We recruited study participants (18-65 years old, currently living in the United States) from Qualtrics’ online participant panel (N = 1,821). The data for this study come from a larger online experiment in which participants were randomly assigned to one of three environmental risk topics (arsenic, bisphenol A [BPA], or volatile organic compounds [VOCs]), one of three message conditions (threat, informational, or no message control), and an information seeking cue (seeking cue or no seeking cue). After message/no message exposure, participants were able to seek additional information about their assigned topic via a search page with live uniform resource locators (URLs). These pages were designed to look like mock Google search pages and hosted on a university website. Links were to government, news, and educational/non-profit websites containing factual information about the risks. This approach allowed us to control the quality of information participants were exposed to, as well as to track their information seeking. Preliminary Results: A majority of participants wanted to seek additional information (n = 991, 54.4%). Based on a descriptive analysis, there were no differences across message conditions on desire to seek information, χ2 (2) = 0.18, p = .91. Nor was there a difference in desire to seek due to the presence of a seeking cue, χ2 (1) = 0.14, p = .71. However, differences were detected across risk topics; more participants in the BPA (n = 336, 54%) and VOC (n = 362, 60%) conditions wanted to seek information than in the arsenic condition (n = 295, 49%), χ2 (2) = 16.92, p < .001. Of the participants who sought additional information, we have recorded analytics data for 54% (n = 525). On the search page, most participants performed two or three actions (n = 361, 69%) and spent an average of 51.93 seconds seeking (SD = 134.92 seconds). Across risk topic conditions, the first URL was the most frequently visited (24%-31%), which for all risks was a government website. Implications: Many individuals were interested in seeking information about environmental health risks, particularly about BPA and VOCs, which have received extensive media attention. Although commonly used, the inclusion of seeking cues in risk messaging may not motivate behaviors. When people do seek, they may turn first to government sources.