Investigating the Role of Communication for Information Seekers' Trust-Related Evaluations of Health Videos on the Web: Content Analysis, Survey Data, and Experiment

Evaluation of the reliability and educational quality of YouTube™ videos on sport nutrition topics

BACKGROUND

YouTube is one of the most widespread social media channels, which is of growing importance in science communication and health education. The validity of medical and health-related information available on YouTube cannot be assured, and videos often contain potentially misleading or inaccurate information. Communication on sport nutrition may have a profound effect on the change in nutrition behavior among athletes, so evidence-based nutrition information must reach athletes. The main goal of the research is to evaluate the quality, reliability, and applicability of sports nutrition YouTube videos as educational material for athletes.

METHODS

A descriptive cross-sectional design was applied, and a systematic search was performed on YouTube. The quality and reliability of the videos were evaluated by applying the most frequently used and highly reliable scoring systems in the literature (e.g., DISCERN, Global Quality Score, and JAMA criteria) and a sports nutrition-specific scoring system (SNSS). Descriptive statistical analyses, two-sample t-test, Spearman correlation, Kruskal - Wallis, and Mann - Whitney U test were used to evaluate the results. A total of 114 YouTube videos met the inclusion criteria.

RESULTS

In 25% of the videos, the sports nutrition information was presented by a dietitian, while in two-thirds, coaches and athletes and other professionals shared sports nutrition knowledge. In terms of video content, the three most common topics were nutrition and health (33%), special diets (21%), and the training diet (17%). For the majority of the videos that received low GQS, JAMAS, DISCERN, and SNSS scores, the accuracy and quality of the analyzed YouTube videos on sports nutrition were inadequate. Videos uploaded by dietitians achieved significantly higher DISCERN, JAMAS, GQS, and SNSS scores. The GQS, SNSS, and DISCERN scores of videos from sports organizations, nonprofit organizations, and independent user sources were lower compared to videos uploaded by academic and professional organizations. Popular sport nutrition videos among users that contain personal stories or the experiences of athletes were deemed less reliable by experts or showed lower educational quality. Henceforth, we found a negative correlation between video popularity and JAMAS, GQS, and SNSS scores.

CONCLUSION

This study revealed that sports nutrition videos on the YouTube video platform show low accuracy and reliability. Professionals working with athletes need to consider misconceptions from sports nutrition videos in their nutrition counseling practice. Due to the popularity of the videos, professionals and professional organizations could use YouTube as an online educational tool to increase the nutrition knowledge of athletes.

Language Use in Conversational Agent-Based Health Communication: Systematic Review

Background

Given the growing significance of conversational agents (CAs), researchers have conducted a plethora of relevant studies on various technology- and usability-oriented issues. However, few investigations focus on language use in CA-based health communication to examine its influence on the user perception of CAs and their role in delivering health care services.

Objective

This review aims to present the language use of CAs in health care to identify the achievements made and breakthroughs to be realized to inform researchers and more specifically CA designers.

Methods

This review was conducted by following the protocols of the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) 2020 statement. We first designed the search strategy according to the research aim and then performed the keyword searches in PubMed and ProQuest databases for retrieving relevant publications (n=179). Subsequently, 3 researchers screened and reviewed the publications independently to select studies meeting the predefined selection criteria. Finally, we synthesized and analyzed the eligible articles (N=11) through thematic synthesis.

Results

Among the 11 included publications, 6 deal exclusively with the language use of the CAs studied, and the remaining 5 are only partly related to this topic. The language use of the CAs in these studies can be roughly classified into six themes: (1) personal pronouns, (2) responses to health and lifestyle prompts, (3) strategic wording and rich linguistic resources, (4) a 3-staged conversation framework, (5) human-like well-manipulated conversations, and (6) symbols and images coupled with phrases. These derived themes effectively engaged users in health communication. Meanwhile, we identified substantial room for improvement based on the inconsistent responses of some CAs and their inability to present large volumes of information on safety-critical health and lifestyle prompts.

Conclusions

This is the first systematic review of language use in CA-based health communication. The results and limitations identified in the 11 included papers can give fresh insights into the design and development, popularization, and research of CA applications. This review can provide practical implications for incorporating positive language use into the design of health CAs and improving their effective language output in health communication. In this way, upgraded CAs will be more capable of handling various health problems particularly in the context of nationwide and even worldwide public health crises.

Effects of Positive Language and Profession on Trustworthiness and Credibility in Online Health Advice: Experimental Study

Background

When searching for health information, many people use the internet as their first source of information. In online health forums, for example, users post their questions and exchange health advice. In recent years, information givers from various professions have begun to use positive language (indicated by the frequent use of positively valenced adjectives) to communicate their information and persuade their audiences.

Objective

The goal of the current study was to answer the following research questions: (1) How does positive language, in comparison to neutral language, influence the trustworthiness of a person arguing in an online health forum and the credibility of their health claims; (2) How does working for a university, compared to working for a lobbying organization, influence the trustworthiness of a person arguing in an online health forum and the credibility of their health claims; and (3) Do the two factors of language style and professional affiliation interact with each other to influence trustworthiness and credibility judgments?

Methods

In a 2 × 2 between-subject experiment, 242 participants read a post from an online health forum and subsequently rated the trustworthiness of the forum post author and the credibility of their information. Within the post, the professional affiliation (scientist vs lobbyist) and language style (neutral vs positive) of the forum post author was varied.

Results

When the forum post author used a positive language style, they were perceived as less trustworthy (high Machiavellianism [P<.001; η²_p=.076], low Integrity [P=.001; η²_p=.045], and low Benevolence [P=.02; η²_p=.025]) and their information was perceived as less credible (low Message Credibility [P=.001; η²_p=.045]). The professional affiliation of the forum post author did not influence their trustworthiness or the credibility of their information.

Conclusions

When searching for health information, information seekers evaluate the language style of forum posts to decide whether forum post authors are trustworthy and their information is credible.