Towards understanding how individuals with inflammatory bowel disease use contemporary social media platforms for health-related discourse

O'Leary, Kate; Coulson, Neil; Perez-Vallejos, Elvira; McAuley, Derek

Abstract

© 2020 With a growing prevalence of social media use worldwide where individuals share varying aspects of their lives, this paper focuses on how individuals with a chronic illness use these communications platforms to discuss their health. This paper aims to provide a qualitative approach to understanding the connection between the technical features offered by Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and the therapeutic affordances experienced. Semi structured interviews were carried out with 38 participants living with Inflammatory Bowel Disease who use Facebook, Twitter and/or Instagram for health-related support. Interview transcripts were analysed systematically to draw connections between platform features and therapeutic affordances. The interview data was thematically coded through an adapted SCENA Model to infer therapeutic affordances, while content analysis identified the technical features discussed. Our findings indicate that most participants (79%) use more than one social media platform for health-related discourse and that features on the platforms offer different therapeutic affordances. Facebook Groups’ privacy settings affording self-presentation as individuals feel comforted that other people cannot see what they post, while hashtags afford connectivity on Twitter and Instagram, but not on Facebook. This approach enabled the authors to identify similarities and differences between social media platforms and their technical features.

Citation

O'Leary, K., Coulson, N., Perez-Vallejos, E., & McAuley, D. (2020). Towards understanding how individuals with inflammatory bowel disease use contemporary social media platforms for health-related discourse. Computers in Human Behavior, 112, Article 106463. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2020.106463

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jun 18, 2020
• Online Publication Date: Jun 27, 2020
• Publication Date: Nov 1, 2020
• Deposit Date: Jan 3, 2021
• Publicly Available Date: Jun 28, 2021
• Journal: Computers in Human Behavior
• Print ISSN: 0747-5632
• Electronic ISSN: 1873-7692
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 112
• Article Number: 106463
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2020.106463
• Keywords: General Psychology; Human-Computer Interaction; Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous)
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/4760465
• Publisher URL: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0747563220302156?via%3Dihub
• Additional Information: This article is maintained by: Elsevier; Article Title: Towards understanding how individuals with inflammatory bowel disease use contemporary social media platforms for health-related discourse; Journal Title: Computers in Human Behavior; CrossRef DOI link to publisher maintained version: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2020.106463; Content Type: article; Copyright: © 2020 Published by Elsevier Ltd.