Efficacy and causal mechanism of an online social media intervention to increase physical activity: Results of a randomized controlled trial.
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Zhang J
PROVIDER: S-EPMC4721409 | biostudies-literature | 2015
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Similar Datasets
Project description:BackgroundOnline social networks, such as Facebook™, have extensive reach, and they use technology that could enhance social support, an established determinant of physical activity. This combination of reach and functionality makes online social networks a promising intervention platform for increasing physical activity.PurposeTo test the efficacy of a physical activity intervention that combined education, physical activity monitoring, and online social networking to increase social support for physical activity compared to an education-only control.DesignRCT. Students (n=134) were randomized to two groups: education-only controls receiving access to a physical activity-focused website (n=67) and intervention participants receiving access to the same website with physical activity self-monitoring and enrollment in a Facebook group (n=67). Recruitment and data collection occurred in 2010 and 2011; data analyses were performed in 2011.Setting/participantsFemale undergraduate students at a large southeastern public university.InterventionIntervention participants were encouraged through e-mails, website instructions, and moderator communications to solicit and provide social support related to increasing physical activity through a physical activity-themed Facebook group. Participants received access to a dedicated website with educational materials and a physical activity self-monitoring tool.Main outcome measuresThe primary outcome was perceived social support for physical activity; secondary outcomes included self-reported physical activity.ResultsParticipants experienced increases in social support and physical activity over time but there were no differences in perceived social support or physical activity between groups over time. Facebook participants posted 259 times to the group. Two thirds (66%) of intervention participants completing a post-study survey indicated that they would recommend the program to friends.ConclusionsUse of an online social networking group plus self-monitoring did not produce greater perceptions of social support or physical activity as compared to education-only controls. Given their promising features and potential reach, efforts to further understand how online social networks can be used in health promotion should be pursued.Trial registrationThis study is registered at clinicaltrials.govNCT01421758.
| S-EPMC3479432 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Interventions to address vaccine hesitancy and increase vaccine acceptance are needed. This study sought to determine if a Web-based, social media intervention increases early childhood immunization. A 3-arm, randomized controlled trial was conducted in Colorado from September 2013 to July 2016. Participants were pregnant women, randomly assigned (3:2:1) to a Web site with vaccine information and interactive social media components (VSM), a Web site with vaccine information (VI), or usual care (UC). Vaccination was assessed in infants of participants from birth to age 200 days. The primary outcome was days undervaccinated, measured as a continuous and dichotomous variable. Infants of 888 participants were managed for 200 days. By using a nonparametric rank-based analysis, mean ranks for days undervaccinated were significantly lower in the VSM arm versus UC (P = .02) but not statistically different between the VI and UC (P = .08) or between VSM and VI arms (P = .63). The proportions of infants up-to-date at age 200 days were 92.5, 91.3, and 86.6 in the VSM, VI, and UC arms, respectively. Infants in the VSM arm were more likely to be up-to-date than infants in the UC arm (odds ratio [OR] = 1.92; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.07-3.47). Up-to-date status was not statistically different between VI and UC arms (OR = 1.62; 95% CI, 0.87-3.00) or between the VSM and VI arms (OR = 1.19, 95% CI, 0.70-2.03). Providing Web-based vaccine information with social media applications during pregnancy can positively influence parental vaccine behaviors.
| S-EPMC8574135 | biostudies-literature
Project description:BackgroundOnline social networks present wide-reaching and flexible platforms through which to deliver health interventions to targeted populations. This study used a social marketing approach to explore teenage girls' perceptions of physical activity and the potential use of online social networks to receive a physical activity intervention.MethodsSix focus groups were conducted with 19 Australian teenage girls (ages 13 to 18 years) with varying levels of physical activity and socioeconomic status. A semi-structured format was used, with groups discussion transcribed verbatim. Content analysis identified emergent themes, with triangulation and memos used to ensure accuracy.ResultsPhysical activity was most appealing when it emphasised sport, exercise and fitness, along with opportunities for socialisation with friends and self-improvement. Participants were receptive to delivery of a physical activity intervention via online social networks, with Facebook the most widely reported site. Participants commonly accessed online social networks via mobile devices and particularly smartphones. Undesirable features included promotion of physical activity in terms of walking; use of cartoon imagery; use of humour; and promotion of the intervention via schools, each of which were considered "uncool". Participants noted that their parents were likely to be supportive of them using an online social networking physical activity intervention, particularly if not promoted as a weight loss intervention.ConclusionThis study identified key features likely to increase the feasibility and retention of an online social networking physical activity intervention for teenage girls. Guidelines for the design of interventions for teenage girls are provided for future applications.
| S-EPMC4774869 | biostudies-literature
Project description:To identify what features of online social networks can increase physical activity, we conducted a 4-arm randomized controlled trial in 2014 in Philadelphia, PA. Students (n = 790, mean age = 25.2) at an university were randomly assigned to one of four conditions composed of either supportive or competitive relationships and either with individual or team incentives for attending exercise classes. The social comparison condition placed participants into 6-person competitive networks with individual incentives. The social support condition placed participants into 6-person teams with team incentives. The combined condition with both supportive and competitive relationships placed participants into 6-person teams, where participants could compare their team's performance to 5 other teams' performances. The control condition only allowed participants to attend classes with individual incentives. Rewards were based on the total number of classes attended by an individual, or the average number of classes attended by the members of a team. The outcome was the number of classes that participants attended. Data were analyzed using multilevel models in 2014. The mean attendance numbers per week were 35.7, 38.5, 20.3, and 16.8 in the social comparison, the combined, the control, and the social support conditions. Attendance numbers were 90% higher in the social comparison and the combined conditions (mean = 1.9, SE = 0.2) in contrast to the two conditions without comparison (mean = 1.0, SE = 0.2) (p = 0.003). Social comparison was more effective for increasing physical activity than social support and its effects did not depend on individual or team incentives.
| S-EPMC5008041 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Actors of public interest today have to fear the adverse impact that stems from social media platforms. Any controversial behavior may promptly trigger temporal, but potentially devastating storms of emotional and aggressive outrage, so called online firestorms. Popular targets of online firestorms are companies, politicians, celebrities, media, academics and many more. This article introduces social norm theory to understand online aggression in a social-political online setting, challenging the popular assumption that online anonymity is one of the principle factors that promotes aggression. We underpin this social norm view by analyzing a major social media platform concerned with public affairs over a period of three years entailing 532,197 comments on 1,612 online petitions. Results show that in the context of online firestorms, non-anonymous individuals are more aggressive compared to anonymous individuals. This effect is reinforced if selective incentives are present and if aggressors are intrinsically motivated.
| S-EPMC4912099 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Health behaviour interventions delivered via online social networks are an increasingly popular approach to addressing lifestyle-related health problems. However, research to date consistently reports poor user engagement and retention. The current study examined user engagement, compliance and retention with Active Team-a gamified physical activity intervention delivered by via an online Facebook application. Associations between engagement and participant (n = 51) demographic and team characteristics (sex, age, education and team size) were examined, as well as temporal trends in engagement during the 50-day intervention. Analyses revealed significant associations between both engagement (p = <0.001) and gamification (p = 0.04) with education, with participants in the middle education category appearing to have the highest rates of engagement and use of gamification features. Gender was also related to engagement, with males demonstrating the highest use of the intervention's gamification features (p = 0.004). Although compliance was consistently high for the duration, engagement declined steadily throughout the intervention. Engagement peaked on Wednesdays, coinciding with the delivery of a customised email reminder. Findings reveal individual differences in engagement with Active Team, highlighting a need to tailor interventions to the target audience. Gamification features may enhance engagement amongst males, who are traditionally recognised as a difficult demographic group to engage. Finally, the use of customised, periodic push reminders delivered by email may enhance user engagement by drawing them back to the intervention and helping to sustain intervention behaviours.
| S-EPMC5684077 | biostudies-literature
Project description:An increasing fraction of today's social interactions occur using online social media as communication channels. Recent worldwide events, such as social movements in Spain or revolts in the Middle East, highlight their capacity to boost people's coordination. Online networks display in general a rich internal structure where users can choose among different types and intensity of interactions. Despite this, there are still open questions regarding the social value of online interactions. For example, the existence of users with millions of online friends sheds doubts on the relevance of these relations. In this work, we focus on Twitter, one of the most popular online social networks, and find that the network formed by the basic type of connections is organized in groups. The activity of the users conforms to the landscape determined by such groups. Furthermore, Twitter's distinction between different types of interactions allows us to establish a parallelism between online and offline social networks: personal interactions are more likely to occur on internal links to the groups (the weakness of strong ties); events transmitting new information go preferentially through links connecting different groups (the strength of weak ties) or even more through links connecting to users belonging to several groups that act as brokers (the strength of intermediary ties).
| S-EPMC3256152 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Online social media platforms represent a promising opportunity for public health promotion. Research is limited, however, on the effectiveness of social media at improving knowledge and awareness of health topics and motivating healthy behavior change. Therefore, we investigated whether participation in an online social media platform and receipt of brief, tailored messages is effective at increasing knowledge, awareness, and prevention behaviors related to human papillomavirus (HPV) and cervical cancer. We conducted an online study in which 782 recruited participants were consecutively assigned to nine-person groups on a social media platform. Participants were shown a unique random set of 20 tailored messages per day over five days. Participants completed a baseline and post survey to assess their knowledge, awareness, and prevention behaviors related to HPV and cervical cancer. There were no statistically significant changes in knowledge and prevention behaviors from the baseline to the post survey among study participants. There was a modest, statistically significant change in response to whether participants had ever heard of HPV, increasing from 90 to 94% (p?=?0.003). Our findings suggest that most study participants had substantial knowledge, awareness, and engagement in positive behaviors related to cervical cancer prevention at the start of the study. Nevertheless, we found that HPV awareness can be increased through brief participation in an online social media platform and receipt of tailored health messages. Further investigation that explores how social media can be used to improve knowledge and adoption of healthy behaviors related to cervical cancer is warranted.
| S-EPMC6289895 | biostudies-literature
Project description:BackgroundInnovative approaches to the dissemination of evidence-based COVID-19 health messages are urgently needed to counter social media misinformation about the pandemic. To this end, we designed a short, wordless, animated global health communication video (the CoVideo), which was rapidly distributed through social media channels to an international audience.ObjectiveThe objectives of this study were to (1) establish the CoVideo's effectiveness in improving COVID-19 prevention knowledge, and (2) establish the CoVideo's effectiveness in increasing behavioral intent toward COVID-19 prevention.MethodsIn May and June 2020, we enrolled 15,163 online participants from the United States, Mexico, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Spain. We randomized participants to (1) the CoVideo arm, (2) an attention placebo control (APC) arm, and (3) a do-nothing arm, and presented 18 knowledge questions about preventive COVID-19 behaviors, which was our first primary endpoint. To measure behavioral intent, our second primary endpoint, we randomized participants in each arm to five list experiments.ResultsGlobally, the video intervention was viewed 1.2 million times within the first 10 days of its release and more than 15 million times within the first 4 months. Knowledge in the CoVideo arm was significantly higher (mean 16.95, 95% CI 16.91-16.99) than in the do-nothing (mean 16.86, 95% CI 16.83-16.90; P<.001) arm. We observed high baseline levels of behavioral intent to perform many of the preventive behaviors featured in the video intervention. We were only able to detect a statistically significant impact of the CoVideo on one of the five preventive behaviors.ConclusionsDespite high baseline levels, the intervention was effective at boosting knowledge of COVID-19 prevention. We were only able to capture a measurable change in behavioral intent toward one of the five COVID-19 preventive behaviors examined in this study. The global reach of this health communication intervention and the high voluntary engagement of trial participants highlight several innovative features that could inform the design and dissemination of public health messages. Short, wordless, animated videos, distributed by health authorities via social media, may be an effective pathway for rapid global health communication during health crises.Trial registrationGerman Clinical Trials Register DRKS00021582; https://tinyurl.com/6r4zkbbn.International registered report identifier (irrid)RR2-10.1186/s13063-020-04942-7.
| S-EPMC8317990 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The Internet is a trusted source of health information for growing majorities of Web users. The promise of online health interventions will be realized with the development of purely online theory-based programs for Web users that are evaluated for program effectiveness and the application of behavior change theory within the online environment. Little is known, however, about the demographic, behavioral, or psychosocial characteristics of Web-health users who represent potential participants in online health promotion research. Nor do we understand how Web users' psychosocial characteristics relate to their health behavior-information essential to the development of effective, theory-based online behavior change interventions.This study examines the demographic, behavioral, and psychosocial characteristics of Web-health users recruited for an online social cognitive theory (SCT)-based nutrition, physical activity, and weight gain prevention intervention, the Web-based Guide to Health (WB-GTH).Directed to the WB-GTH site by advertisements through online social and professional networks and through print and online media, participants were screened, consented, and assessed with demographic, physical activity, psychosocial, and food frequency questionnaires online (taking a total of about 1.25 hours); they also kept a 7-day log of daily steps and minutes walked.From 4700 visits to the site, 963 Web users consented to enroll in the study: 83% (803) were female, participants' mean age was 44.4 years (SD 11.03 years), 91% (873) were white, and 61% (589) were college graduates; participants' median annual household income was approximately US $85,000. Participants' daily step counts were in the low-active range (mean 6485.78, SD 2352.54) and overall dietary levels were poor (total fat g/day, mean 77.79, SD 41.96; percent kcal from fat, mean 36.51, SD 5.92; fiber g/day, mean 17.74, SD 7.35; and fruit and vegetable servings/day, mean 4.03, SD 2.33). The Web-health users had good self-efficacy and outcome expectations for health behavior change; however, they perceived little social support for making these changes and engaged in few self-regulatory behaviors. Consistent with SCT, theoretical models provided good fit to Web-users' data (root mean square error of the approximation [RMSEA] < .05). Perceived social support and use of self-regulatory behaviors were strong predictors of physical activity and nutrition behavior. Web users' self-efficacy was also a good predictor of healthier levels of physical activity and dietary fat but not of fiber, fruits, and vegetables. Social support and self-efficacy indirectly predicted behavior through self-regulation, and social support had indirect effects through self-efficacy.Results suggest Web-health users visiting and ultimately participating in online health interventions may likely be middle-aged, well-educated, upper middle class women whose detrimental health behaviors put them at risk of obesity, heart disease, some cancers, and diabetes. The success of Internet physical activity and nutrition interventions may depend on the extent to which they lead users to develop self-efficacy for behavior change, but perhaps as important, the extent to which these interventions help them garner social-support for making changes. Success of these interventions may also depend on the extent to which they provide a platform for setting goals, planning, tracking, and providing feedback on targeted behaviors.
| S-EPMC3221350 | biostudies-literature