Farr Deeonna E, Battle Darian A, Hall Marla B
Department of Health Education and Promotion, College of Health and Human Performance, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC, United States.
Department of Public Health, Brody School of Medicine, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC, United States.
JMIR Form Res. 2022 Jan 12;6(1):e31759. doi: 10.2196/31759.
Recruitment of diverse populations for health research studies remains a challenge. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated these challenges by limiting in-person recruitment efforts and placing additional demands on potential participants. Social media, through the use of Facebook advertisements, has the potential to address recruitment challenges. However, existing reports are inconsistent with regard to the success of this strategy. Additionally, limited information is available about processes that can be used to increase the diversity of study participants.
A Qualtrics survey was fielded to ascertain women's knowledge of and health care experiences related to breast density. This paper describes the process of using Facebook advertisements for recruitment and the effectiveness of various advertisement strategies.
Facebook advertisements were placed in 2 rounds between June and July 2020. During round 1, multiple combinations of headlines and interest terms were tested to determine the most cost-effective advertisement. The best performing advertisement was used in round 2 in combination with various strategies to enhance the diversity of the survey sample. Advertisement performance, cost, and survey respondent data were collected and examined.
In round 1, a total of 45 advertisements with 5 different headlines were placed, and the average cost per link click for each headline ranged from US $0.12 to US $0.79. Of the 164 women recruited in round 1, in total 91.62% were eligible to complete the survey. Advertisements used during recruitment in round 2 resulted in an average cost per link click of US $0.11. During the second round, 478 women attempted the survey, and 87.44% were eligible to participate. The majority of survey respondents were White (80.41%), over the age of 55 years (63.94%), and highly educated (63.71%).
Facebook advertisements can be used to recruit respondents for health research quickly, but this strategy may yield participants who are less racially diverse, more educated, and older than the general population. Researchers should consider recruiting participants through other methods in addition to creating Facebook advertisements targeting underrepresented populations.
为健康研究招募多样化的人群仍然是一项挑战。新冠疫情通过限制面对面招募工作以及对潜在参与者提出额外要求，加剧了这些挑战。社交媒体通过使用脸书广告，有潜力应对招募挑战。然而，现有报告在该策略的成功性方面并不一致。此外，关于可用于增加研究参与者多样性的流程的信息有限。
开展了一项Qualtrics调查，以确定女性对乳腺密度的了解及相关医疗保健经历。本文描述了使用脸书广告进行招募的过程以及各种广告策略的有效性。
2020年6月至7月期间分两轮投放脸书广告。在第一轮中，测试了标题和兴趣词的多种组合，以确定最具成本效益的广告。表现最佳的广告在第二轮中与各种策略结合使用，以提高调查样本的多样性。收集并检查了广告表现、成本和调查受访者数据。
在第一轮中，共投放了45条带有5种不同标题的广告，每个标题的每次链接点击平均成本在0.12美元至0.79美元之间。在第一轮招募的164名女性中，总计91.62%有资格完成调查。第二轮招募期间使用的广告每次链接点击平均成本为0.11美元。在第二轮中，478名女性尝试参与调查，87.44%有资格参与。大多数调查受访者为白人（80.41%），年龄超过55岁（63.94%），且受教育程度高（63.71%）。
脸书广告可用于快速为健康研究招募受访者，但该策略招募的参与者可能在种族上不如总体人群多样化，受教育程度更高且年龄更大。除了创建针对代表性不足人群的脸书广告外，研究人员还应考虑通过其他方法招募参与者。
