 Can interactivity make a difference? Effects of interactivity on the comprehension of and attitudes toward online health contentMia Liza A. Lustria Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 2007, vol. 58, issue 6, 766-776 Abstract: The Internet is increasingly being recognized for its potential for health communication and education. The perceived relative advantage of the Internet over other media is its cost‐effectiveness and interactivity, which in turn contribute to its persuasive capabilities. Ironically, despite its potential, we are nowhere nearer understanding how interactivity affects processing of health information and its contribution in terms of health outcomes. An experiment was conducted to examine the effects of Web interactivity on comprehension of and attitudes towards two health Web sites, and whether individual differences might moderate such effects. Two sites on skin cancer were designed with different levels of interactivity and randomly assigned to 441 undergraduate students (aged 18–26) at a large southeastern university. The findings suggest that interactivity can significantly affect comprehension as well as attitudes towards health Web sites. The article also discusses insights into the role of interactivity on online health communications, and presents implications for the effective design of online health content. Date: 2007 Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:jamist:v:58:y:2007:i:6:p:766-776 Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from Access Statistics for this article More articles in Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology from Association for Information Science & Technology |
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