Health Communication on the Internet: An Effective Channel for Health Behavior Change?

Published in Volume 3, Number 1 of the Journal of Health Communication, this 9-page report "presents a theoretical rationale for using the Internet to conduct persuasive public health interventions."

Having observed that "mass media channels are appropriate for creating awareness, but interpersonal interactions are essential for persuading individuals to adopt health-promoting behaviors" (in short, both channels are necessary, on this view), the authors examine "the conceptual bases of persuasion". They stress that persuasion - a form of social influence whose power lies in its ability to effect the internalisation of specific attitudes - is conceptually and ethically distinct from coercion, a strategy that is less powerful in the long term "because it relies on the presence of an authority figure to activate and reinforce behavior". They set forth two criteria for a health communication to be persuasive:

1. transactional - it must allow for give and take between persuader and persuadee by: motivating the receiver to actively attend to messages and perceive and interpret their content, including "iterative and transactional solicitation of feedback from audience members", and elaborating arguments and counterarguments to encourage individuals to move through the process of attitude change.
2. response-dependent - it must be constructed as a receiver-driven process that is dependent on a series of responses from the persuadee. The idea here is that "The recipient of a persuasive message is always free to participate or not participate in the
   process of persuasion. However, messages perceived as relevant to or congruent with existing attitudes or needs are more likely to facilitate personal involvement in the persuasion process..."

In evaluating this strategy, the authors affirm that the World Wide Web and other internet-based resources have many of the characteristics necessary for persuasive communication in that they combine the positive attributes of interpersonal and mass communication. For one thing, the internet is interactive, and provides "audible and visual feedback that is customized to be responsive to the solicited information". For example, "Graphics and video clips can be used to make the information source appear similar to the receiver, praise can be offered for receiver agreement, and the interactive process itself can be used to encourage receiver attention, facilitate message comprehension, and identify and modify potential sources of resistance to change." Second, the authors observe that, like traditional mass media formats, the internet has the capacity to reach large and geographically diffuse audiences - at a relatively low cost.

In light of these findings, the authors conclude that "The potential of Internet-based resources to marry the advantages of interpersonal and mass communication provides a strong rationale for research leading to the development of Internet-based public health interventions." They stress that the development of multidisciplinary teams is key to developing effective internet-based health communications: "Establishing such teams will be a necessary, challenging, and exciting aspect in the development of Internet-based public health interventions that are both salient and effective."