Using Social Media to Inform Public Health Promotion & Practice: An Assessment of Novel Applications for Exploring User-Generated Content

Background: Adolescents are acutely receptive to wireless technologies and can be a challenging population to engage with conventional approaches to health promotion.

Program background: The purpose of this study is to provide an introductory framework for understanding how user-generated social media content can be used to inform strategies for promoting adolescent health and wellness. Teen pregnancy prevention is one immediate public health priority that is well-positioned to benefit from the strengths and capital of social media.

Evaluation Methods and Results: The analysis formulates approaches for extracting and visualizing semantic data from microblogs to identify meaningful themes and constructs: (1) transposing risk and responsibility; (2) disincentivizing pregnancy and childbearing through recall; and (3) projecting mothethood. It provides an overview of selected methods for analysis, including coding of health-related tweets and the use of experimental software tools and platforms designed for visualizing semantic data. This project proposes and supports a rationale for considering user-generated social media content a form of primary data.

Conclusions: Analyzing user-generated text is a strategy for determining how people assess risk and make decisions related to sexual and reproductive health (e.g., contraceptive pill usage). Reaching unmotivated health information consumers presents a challenge across the continuum of public health education and practice. Extending their application to health research, user-generated microblogs can be used to expand the knowledge base on influences that dictate adolescents' awareness and intentions to use contraception for preventing pregnancy and safeguarding overall health status.

Implications for research and/or practice: The techniques proposed are intended to supplement the formative steps of public health program planning and development. Given the surge of new social media platforms, there is an opportunity for health and technology to evolve more synergistically. Embedding health messages in social networking channels is one strategy for creating awareness and connecting with discrete internet consumers.