a Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR) , University of Amsterdam , Amsterdam , Netherlands.
b Department of Health Sciences and Health Policy , Universitat Luzern , Luzern , Switzerland.
J Health Commun. 2019;24(2):129-140. doi: 10.1080/10810730.2019.1583701. Epub 2019 Mar 21.
When looking for health information, many people turn to the Internet. Searching for online health information (OHI), however, also involves the risk of confirmation bias by means of selective exposure to information that confirms one's existing beliefs and a biased evaluation of this information. This study tests whether biased selection and biased evaluation of OHI occur in the context of early-childhood vaccination and whether people's health literacy (HL) level either prevents or facilitates these processes. Vaccination beliefs were measured for 480 parents of young children (aged 0-4 years) using an online survey, after which they were exposed to a list of ten vaccine-related message headers. People were asked to select those headers that interested them most. They also had to evaluate two texts which discussed vaccination positively and negatively for credibility, usefulness, and convincingness. The results showed that people select more belief-consistent information compared to belief-inconsistent information and perceived belief-confirming information as being more credible, useful, and convincing. Biased selection and biased perceptions of message convincingness were more prevalent among people with higher HL, and health communication professionals should be aware of this finding in their practice.
当人们寻找健康信息时，许多人会转向互联网。然而，搜索在线健康信息（OHI）也存在确认偏差的风险，即人们会选择性地接触那些证实自己现有信念的信息，并对这些信息产生有偏差的评价。本研究测试了在儿童疫苗接种的背景下，OHI 是否会出现有偏差的选择和评价，以及人们的健康素养（HL）水平是否会阻止或促进这些过程。通过在线调查，对 480 名幼儿（0-4 岁）的家长的疫苗接种信念进行了测量，之后他们接触了十个与疫苗相关的消息标题列表。人们被要求选择最感兴趣的标题。他们还必须评估两篇对疫苗接种进行正面和负面讨论的文本，以评价其可信度、有用性和说服力。结果表明，与不一致的信息相比，人们更倾向于选择一致的信息，并且认为与信念一致的信息更可信、有用和有说服力。在 HL 较高的人群中，有偏差的信息选择和对信息说服力的有偏差的感知更为普遍，健康传播专业人员在实践中应该意识到这一发现。
