1 University at Buffalo, The State University of New York , Buffalo, New York.
Cyberpsychol Behav Soc Netw. 2013 Sep;16(9):669-73. doi: 10.1089/cyber.2012.0350. Epub 2013 Jun 20.
Providing and seeking social support are important aspects of social exchange. New communication technologies, especially social network sites (SNSs), facilitate the process of support exchange. An increasing number of health organizations are using SNSs. However, how they provide and seek social support via SNSs has yet to garner academic attention. This study examined the types of social support provided and sought by health organizations on Twitter. A content analysis was conducted on 1,500 tweets sent by a random sample of 58 health organizations within 2 months. Findings indicate that providing informational and emotional support, as well as seeking instrumental support, were the main types of social support exchanged by health organizations through Twitter. This study provides a typology for studying social support exchanges by health organizations, and recommends strategies for health organizations regarding the effective use of Twitter.
提供和寻求社会支持是社会交换的重要方面。新的通信技术，特别是社交网站（SNS），促进了支持交换的过程。越来越多的健康组织正在使用 SNS，但它们如何通过 SNS 提供和寻求社会支持尚未引起学术界的关注。本研究考察了健康组织在 Twitter 上提供和寻求社会支持的类型。对 58 个健康组织在两个月内随机抽取的 1500 条推文进行了内容分析。结果表明，通过 Twitter，健康组织主要提供信息和情感支持以及寻求工具性支持。本研究为研究健康组织的社会支持交换提供了一个分类法，并为健康组织提出了关于有效使用 Twitter 的策略。
