When utilizing social media to nudge folks towards secure and wholesome behaviour, it’s important to ensure the phrases match the images, in accordance with a brand new examine.
After social media posts, mother and father of younger youngsters had been higher capable of recall security messages akin to tips on how to put a child safely to sleep when the pictures within the posts aligned with the messages within the textual content, the researchers discovered.
The examine seems within the Journal of Health Communication.
“Many times, scientists and safety experts aren’t involved in decisions about social media for health agencies and other organisations, and we end up seeing images that have nothing to do with the safety message or worse, images that contradict the guidance,” stated lead writer Liz Klein, an affiliate professor of public well being at The Ohio State University.
Take the secure sleep instance, for example. The researchers discovered posts that advocated a bumper-free crib for child however used a picture of an toddler in a crib with bumpers.
They noticed posts about stopping head harm with bike helmets illustrated by footage of youngsters with out bike helmets.
“In this study, we were trying to understand how much those mismatches matter — do people understand the message even if the picture isn’t right? Does the picture really matter?” Klein stated.
Their solutions got here from analysis utilizing eye-tracking know-how to gauge the eye younger mother and father paid to numerous posts, and subsequent checks to see what they recalled in regards to the security messages.
When the 150 mother and father within the examine had been proven a trio of posts with matched imagery and textual content and three different posts with mismatched visible and written messages, they spent far longer on the matched posts — 5.three seconds, in comparison with the three.three seconds their eyes lingered on the mismatched posts.
Further, the matched messages appeared to make a distinction in understanding and recall of security messages. After accounting for variations in well being literacy and social media use amongst members, the researchers discovered that every second of viewing time on matched posts was related to a 2.eight % improve in a security information rating.
“With nearly 70 percent of adults reporting use of social media, and many parents using social media and other internet sources to keep current on injury prevention strategies, social media is a great opportunity to broadcast safety and injury prevention messages,” stated examine co-author Lara McKenzie, a principal investigator within the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus.
“As more health organisations and public health agencies use social media to share health information with the public, the findings of our study underscore the need to ensure that the imagery and text in social media posts are aligned,” added McKenzie.
Klein stated she understands that these managing social media accounts could also be drawn to pictures which are probably the most attention-grabbing. But in the case of well being and security, this examine means that ensuring the picture and the textual content are sending the identical message is extra necessary.
“If you want people to put their medicine up and out of reach of children, kids to wear their bike helmets, or new parents to remember that babies should always go to sleep on their backs, alone and in a crib — that’s where matching matters. Maybe save the eye-grabbing stuff and the humorous posts for different purposes,” Klein stated.
Klein stated the findings on this examine seemingly prolong past youngster security messaging to any variety of well being and security campaigns. However, he added that there is extra work to be accomplished to grasp tips on how to finest harness the facility of social media for several types of public well being communication.
“We need to pay more attention to how we communicate with the people we’re trying to influence with health and safety guidance. All of us can do a better job of thinking about how we use our social media accounts to contribute to better public health,” she stated.
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