Understanding the Factors Influencing Patient E-Health Literacy in Online Health Communities (OHCs): A Social Cognitive Theory Perspective

Junjie Zhou and Tingting Fan
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Junjie Zhou: Department of Business Administration, Business School, Shantou University, No.243 Daxue Road, Shantou 515063, Guangdong, China
Tingting Fan: Department of Business Administration, Business School, Shantou University, No.243 Daxue Road, Shantou 515063, Guangdong, China

IJERPH, 2019, vol. 16, issue 14, 1-12

Abstract: Although online health communities (OHCs) are increasingly popular in public health promotion, few studies have explored the factors influencing patient e-health literacy in OHCs. This paper aims to address the above gap. Based on social cognitive theory, we identified one behavioral factor (i.e., health knowledge seeking) and one social environmental factor (i.e., social interaction ties) and proposed that both health knowledge seeking and social interaction ties directly influence patient e-health literacy; in addition, social interaction ties positively moderate the effect of health knowledge seeking on patient e-health literacy. We collected 333 valid data points and verified our three hypotheses. The empirical results provide two crucial findings. First, both health knowledge seeking and social interaction ties positively influence patient e-health literacy in OHCs. Second, social interaction ties positively moderate the effect of health knowledge seeking on patient e-health literacy. These findings firstly contribute to public health literature by exploring the mechanism of how different factors influence patient e-health literacy in OHCs and further contribute to e-health literacy literature by verifying the impact of social environmental factors.

Keywords: e-health literacy; online health communities; social cognitive theory (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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