scholarly journals Analyzing Twitter as a Platform for Alzheimer-Related Dementia Awareness: Thematic Analyses of Tweets (Preprint)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tiffany Yi-Mei Cheng ◽  
Lisa Liu ◽  
Benjamin KP Woo
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Social Media ◽  
General Public ◽  
The United States ◽  
Public Health Care ◽  
Political Climate ◽  
Health Advocacy ◽  
Twitter Users ◽  
Mental Health Advocacy

BACKGROUND Dementia is a prevalent disorder among adults and often subjects an individual and his or her family. Social media websites may serve as a platform to raise awareness for dementia and allow researchers to explore health-related data. OBJECTIVE The objective of this study was to utilize Twitter, a social media website, to examine the content and location of tweets containing the keyword “dementia” to better understand the reasons why individuals discuss dementia. We adopted an approach that analyzed user location, user category, and tweet content subcategories to classify large publicly available datasets. METHODS A total of 398 tweets were collected using the Twitter search application programming interface with the keyword “dementia,” circulated between January and February 2018. Twitter users were categorized into 4 categories: general public, health care field, advocacy organization, and public broadcasting. Tweets posted by “general public” users were further subcategorized into 5 categories: mental health advocate, affected persons, stigmatization, marketing, and other. Placement into the categories was done through thematic analysis. RESULTS A total of 398 tweets were written by 359 different screen names from 28 different countries. The largest number of Twitter users were from the United States and the United Kingdom. Within the United States, the largest number of users were from California and Texas. The majority (281/398, 70.6%) of Twitter users were categorized into the “general public” category. Content analysis of tweets from the “general public” category revealed stigmatization (113/281, 40.2%) and mental health advocacy (102/281, 36.3%) as the most common themes. Among tweets from California and Texas, California had more stigmatization tweets, while Texas had more mental health advocacy tweets. CONCLUSIONS Themes from the content of tweets highlight the mixture of the political climate and the supportive network present on Twitter. The ability to use Twitter to combat stigma and raise awareness of mental health indicates the benefits that can potentially be facilitated via the platform, but negative stigmatizing tweets may interfere with the effectiveness of this social support.

scholarly journals #UsapTayo: Utilizing Tweetchat for Mental Health Advocacy in the Philippines

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (Supplement_5) ◽  
Author(s):  
Y Zuniga ◽  
R Dahildahil ◽  
J Mina ◽  
A Libanan ◽  
R Mojica ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Suicide Prevention ◽  
Penetration Rate ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
Health Concern ◽  
Health Advocacy ◽  
Social Media Platforms ◽  
Twitter Users ◽  
Mental Health Advocacy

Abstract Mental health remains a public health concern across countries. It is estimated that 1 in 4 people will be affected by mental or neurological disorders at some point in their lives. In the Philippines, about 3 million Filipinos live with depression. Mortality rate for suicide is 3.2 per 100,000 population. Meanwhile, social media use remains high in the country with 76 million users in 2019. It is thus important to explore potential ways in maximizing social media for mental health advocacy. From January 1 to December 31, 2019, a mental health tweetchat “#UsapTayo” (direct Filipino translation of WHO's #LetsTalk) was observed every 10th, 20th, 30th of the month from 7:00 to 8:00 PM. #UsapTayo aimed to answer how effective social media platforms like Twitter in promoting mental health awareness and education among Filipino Twitter users. Engagements and impressions from users were measured using Symplur, a healthcare hashtag analytics platform. From January to December 2019, a total of 4,626 users participated in the tweetchat. Impressions for the year reached 52 million with an average of 4.75 million impressions per month. Engagements and impressions were recorded highest in the month of September with 1,169 users and 8.74 million, respectively. Overall, the tweetchat #UsapTayo was able to generate 14,385 tweets for the complete calendar year with suicide prevention identified as the most discussed topic among Filipino Twitter users. Given the country's high social media penetration rate at 71% with Twitter ranking as the second most frequently used social media, leveraging this platform improves access to information and helps in normalizing conversations on mental health. #UsapTayo then partnered with #ThereIsHelp, a project initiated by Twitter to create safer spaces online through integration of suicide prevention measures. It was also recommended convening a multistakeholder consultation to develop a national mental health promotion and communication plan. Key messages Innovative platforms in social media like tweetchat can be leveraged to promote safer digital space for mental health and to strengthen online effort for suicide prevention especially among youth. It is important to maximize the use of social media platforms for mental health advocacy particularly suicide prevention given the Philippines’ high penetration rate and access to social media.

scholarly journals The COVID-19 Pandemic and Mental Health Concerns on Twitter in the United States

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Senqi Zhang ◽  
Li Sun ◽  
Daiwei Zhang ◽  
Pin Li ◽  
Yue Liu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Topic Modeling ◽  
The United States ◽  
Allocation Model ◽  
Health Concerns ◽  
Demographic Composition ◽  
The Us ◽  
Mental Health Concerns ◽  
Twitter Users

AbstractBackgroundMental health illness is a growing problem in recent years. During the COVID-19 pandemic, mental health concerns (such as fear and loneliness) have been actively discussed on social media.ObjectiveIn this study, we aim to examine mental health discussions on Twitter during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States and infer the demographic composition of Twitter users who had mental health concerns.MethodsCOVID-19 related tweets from March 5th, 2020 to January 31st, 2021 were collected through Twitter streaming API using COVID-19 related keywords (e.g., “corona”, “covid19”, “covid”). By further filtering using mental health keywords (e.g., “depress”, “failure”, “hopeless”), we extracted mental health-related tweets from the US. Topic modeling using the Latent Dirichlet Allocation model was conducted to monitor users’ discussions surrounding mental health concerns. Demographic inference using deep learning algorithms (including Face++ and Ethnicolr) was performed to infer the demographic composition of Twitter users who had mental health concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic.ResultsWe observed a positive correlation between mental health concerns on Twitter and the COVID-19 pandemic in the US. Topic modeling showed that “stay-at-home”, “death poll” and “politics and policy” were the most popular topics in COVID-19 mental health tweets. Among Twitter users who had mental health concerns during the pandemic, Males, White, and 30-49 age group people were more likely to express mental health concerns. In addition, Twitter users from the east and west coast had more mental health concerns.ConclusionsThe COVID-19 pandemic has a significant impact on mental health concerns on Twitter in the US. Certain groups of people (such as Males, White) were more likely to have mental health concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic.

scholarly journals Who Has to Tell Their Trauma Story and How Hard Will It Be? Influence of Cultural Stigma and Narrative Redemption on the Storying of Sexual Violence

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brianna C Delker ◽  
Rowan Salton ◽  
Kate C. McLean ◽  
Moin Syed
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Sexual Violence ◽  
Natural Disaster ◽  
The United States ◽  
Societal Implications ◽  
The Public ◽  
Cultural Preference ◽  
Cultural Stigma

Although survivors of sexual violence have shared their stories with the public on social media and mass media platforms in growing numbers, less is known about how general audiences perceive such trauma stories. These perceptions can have profound consequences for survivor mental health. In the present experimental, vignette-based studies, we anticipated that cultural stigma surrounding sexual violence and cultural preference for positive (redemptive) endings to adversity in the United States (U.S.) would shape perceptions. Four samples of U.S. adults (N=1872) rated first-person narratives of 6 more stigmatizing (i.e., sexual violence) or less stigmatizing (e.g., natural disaster) traumatic events. Confirming pre-registered hypotheses, sexual violence trauma (versus other types of trauma) stories were perceived as more difficult to tell, and their storytellers less likeable, even when they had redemptive endings. Disconfirming other pre-registered hypotheses, redemptive (versus negative) story endings did not boost the perceived likelihood or obligation to share a sexual violence trauma story. Rather, redemptive (versus negative) story endings only boosted the perceived likelihood, obligation, and ease of telling other, less stigmatizing types of trauma stories. Findings suggest that sexual violence survivors do not benefit, to the same degree as other survivors, from telling their stories with the culturally valued narrative template of redemption. Clinical and societal implications of the less receptive climate for sexual violence stories are discussed.

scholarly journals Investigation of Geographic and Macrolevel Variations in LGBTQ Patient Experiences: Longitudinal Social Media Analysis

10.2196/17087 ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (7) ◽  
pp. e17087
Author(s):  
Yulin Hswen ◽  
Amanda Zhang ◽  
Kara C Sewalk ◽  
Gaurav Tuli ◽  
John S Brownstein ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Patient Experience ◽  
State Level ◽  
The United States ◽  
Media Analysis ◽  
Political Climate ◽  
Social Media Data ◽  
Political Identification ◽  
Twitter Users ◽  
Media Data

Background Discrimination in the health care system contributes to worse health outcomes among lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) patients. Objective The aim of this study is to examine disparities in patient experience among LGBTQ persons using social media data. Methods We collected patient experience data from Twitter from February 2013 to February 2017 in the United States. We compared the sentiment of patient experience tweets between Twitter users who self-identified as LGBTQ and non-LGBTQ. The effect of state-level partisan identity on patient experience sentiment and differences between LGBTQ users and non-LGBTQ users were analyzed. Results We observed lower (more negative) patient experience sentiment among 13,689 LGBTQ users compared to 1,362,395 non-LGBTQ users. Increasing state-level liberal political identification was associated with higher patient experience sentiment among all users but had stronger effects for LGBTQ users. Conclusions Our findings highlight that social media data can yield insights about patient experience for LGBTQ persons and suggest that a state-level sociopolitical environment influences patient experience for this group. Efforts are needed to reduce disparities in patient care for LGBTQ persons while taking into context the effect of the political climate on these inequities.

Online mental health advocacy groups social support, stigma management and advocacy messaging, and audience reactions to this messaging

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Sarah Smith-Frigerio
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Peer Support ◽  
Advocacy Groups ◽  
Management Communication ◽  
Health Advocacy ◽  
Stigma Management ◽  
Health Crisis ◽  
Public Health Crisis ◽  
Mental Health Advocacy

[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT AUTHOR'S REQUEST.] Mental health concerns continue to be stigmatized in traditional media, in spite of -- or perhaps contributing to --high prevalence rates of mental health diagnoses globally. This has led to the World Health Organization (WHO) declaring a public health crisis. Given stigmatization in traditional media, mental health communication scholars are investigating how mental health concerns are depicted and discussed in digital and social media spaces, but this area remains underexplored. The WHO has also outlined the importance of grassroots mental health advocacy groups in addressing the public health crisis, and an understanding of such groups' social media content is imperative. Through the theoretical lenses of information and resources, social support, advocacy, and stigma management communication, case studies of two grassroots mental health advocacy groups were conducted. Analysis of 200 social media posts, interviews with 5 content creators, and interviews with 15 users of the groups' social media feeds identified five major themes: providing information and resources through peer support, using stories, encouragement and connection to provide peer support, using peer support to foster advocacy work amongst users, progressing through stigma management communication strategies from accepting to challenging, and the importance of what is left unsaid. The theoretical and practical implications of these themes are discussed in the final chapter.

How do emergency managers use social media platforms?

2014 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 251 ◽  
Author(s):  
DeeDee M. Bennett, PhD
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Emergency Management ◽  
General Public ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Public ◽  
Management Agency ◽  
Emergency Managers ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Social Media Platforms

Social media platforms are increasingly becoming a useful tool for victims, humanitarians, volunteers, and the general public to communicate during disasters. Research has shown that there are multiple advantages to using social media and the applicability of these platforms crosses several different types of disasters (human-caused, natural, and terrorist) here in the United States and abroad. However, some emergency management agencies have been reluctant to use social media as one of their many communications tools. In this study, the usefulness of social media for emergency management was examined over a 30-day period following a series of tornadoes. Using an observational approach, the public posts disseminated from an emergency management agency were analyzed to determine how two social media platforms were used. The findings show how emergency management agencies could leverage the connectedness of social media to reach victims and make unlikely partnerships.

Insta-Grated Plastic Surgery Residencies: 2020 Update

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Chartier ◽  
Akash A Chandawarkar ◽  
Daniel J Gould ◽  
W Grant Stevens
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Plastic Surgery ◽  
General Public ◽  
Media Use ◽  
The United States ◽  
Social Media Use ◽  
Absolute Increase ◽  
Residency Programs ◽  
Media Component

Abstract Background Recent evidence shows accelerating worldwide adoption of social media and suggests a commensurate increase in social media use by integrated plastic surgery residency programs in the United States. Programs nationwide are now making strides to include a longitudinal social media component in their plastic surgery curriculum. Objectives The aim of this study was to investigate the use of Instagram by plastic surgery residency programs and to describe trends in adoption, volume, and content. Methods Current active Instagram accounts affiliated to integrated plastic surgery residency programs were surveyed to identify date of first post, number of posts, number of followers, number of followings, engagement rate, most-liked posts, and content of posts. All data were collected on May 12, 2020. Results Sixty-nine out of 81 (85.2%) integrated plastic surgery residency programs had Instagram accounts, totaling 5,544 posts. This represents an absolute increase in program accounts of 392% since 2018. The 100 most-liked posts were categorized as: promotion of the program/individual (46), resident life (32), promotion of plastic surgery (14), and education (8). Conclusions Instagram use by plastic surgery residency programs has drastically increased since it was first evaluated in 2018. This trend will continue as we reach near saturation of residency programs with accounts. We remain steadfast in our belief that the advantages of social media use by plastic surgeons and trainees are far outweighed by the potential community-wide impacts of violations of good social media practice on peers, patients, and the general public.

scholarly journals Experiences and perceptions of perinatal depression among new immigrant Chinese parents: a qualitative study

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Qiao Li ◽  
Wenqing Xue ◽  
Wenjie Gong ◽  
Xin Quan ◽  
Quanlei Li ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Mental Health Services ◽  
Focus Group ◽  
Health Services ◽  
Perinatal Depression ◽  
Perinatal Period ◽  
The United States ◽  
Chinese Parents

Abstract Background Immigrant status, acculturation level, race and ethnicity have been found to contribute to the utilization of mental health services in the perinatal period. This study explored perinatal experiences and perceptions among Chinese immigrant mothers and their spouses, as well as the possible barriers and facilitators that affect their health care utilization. Methods We recruited 13 women ages 18–35 years born in mainland China, living in Rochester, New York, and residing less than 5 years in the United States. Participants primary language was Mandarin Chinese and all had given birth to at least one live infant within the past 7 years. Participants’ age was at least 18 years old at the time of delivery. Five spouses also participated. We divided women in two focus groups and held one focus group for men, with data collection including demographic questionnaires and semi-structured focus group questions conducted in December 2014. Data were analyzed following thematic analysis. Results Four themes emerged: experiences of perinatal depression; perceptions of perinatal depression; general preventive and coping strategies; and attitudes toward the supportive use social media applications (apps) and text messaging during the perinatal period. Participants had limited knowledge of perinatal depression and had difficulty distinguishing between normal perinatal mood fluctuations and more severe symptoms of depression. They discussed immigrant-related stress, conflicts with parents/in-laws while “doing the month”, the perceived gap between the ideal of “perfect moms” and reality, and challenges with parenting as the causes of perinatal depression. Women approved of screening for the condition but were conservative about follow-up interventions. As for the management of perinatal depression, participants preferred to deal with the problem within the family before seeking external help, due to potential stigma as well as Chinese traditional culture. They were receptive to obtaining pertinent health information from anonymous social media apps, preferring these to personal text messages. Conclusion The recent immigrant Chinese parents to the United States in the study had limited knowledge of perinatal depression and did not make full use of mental health services for support due to language and cultural barriers. Screening for perinatal depression is only the first step. Future research should explore what interventions may serve as an acceptable approach to overcoming these gaps.

scholarly journals Perceptions of the IQOS Heated Tobacco Product on Twitter in the United States

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Canruo Zou ◽  
Xueting Wang ◽  
Zidian Xie ◽  
Dongmei Li
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Health Risks ◽  
Public Perception ◽  
The United States ◽  
Public Perceptions ◽  
The Public ◽  
Enforcement Policy ◽  
Quit Smoking ◽  
Twitter Users

After the approval of the sales of IQOS in the United States market, discussions about IQOS have become active on social media. Twitter is a popular social media platform to understand public opinions toward IQOS. This study aims to explore public perceptions toward IQOS on Twitter in the United States. IQOS-related tweets from the United States between November 19, 2019, and August 24, 2020, were collected using a Twitter streaming application programming interface (API). Sentiment analysis was performed to determine whether the public perceptions toward IQOS were positive, neutral, or negative. In addition, topics discussed in these tweets were manually coded. From November 2019 to August 2020, the number of tweets discussing IQOS was relatively constant except for a peak starting from July 7, 2020, which lasted for 4 days. Among IQOS tweets with positive sentiments, the most popular topic is “IQOS is safer than cigarettes,” followed by “IQOS helps quit smoking.” Among tweets with negative sentiments, the most popular topic is “illegal marketing/selling to youth,” followed by “health risks/fire hazards.” “FDA approval/regulation” is the most popular topic for tweets with neutral sentiments. After the announcement of the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) enforcement policy on unauthorized flavored e-cigarette products on January 2, 2020, the proportion of tweets with positive attitudes toward IQOS significantly increased, while the proportion of negative tweets significantly decreased. Our study showed that the public perception of IQOS in the United States became more positive after the FDA enforcement policy on flavored e-cigarettes. While many Twitter users thought IQOS is safer than cigarettes and helps quit smoking, some Twitter users complained about the illegal marketing and health risks of IQOS. These findings provide useful information on future tobacco regulations.

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