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Health Promotion International Feb 2024Sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) taxes are present in many countries with evidence that they are effective in decreasing purchases of SSBs. However, in Australia where SSB...
Sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) taxes are present in many countries with evidence that they are effective in decreasing purchases of SSBs. However, in Australia where SSB consumption per capita is high, and calls for an SSB tax are frequent, there is no SSB tax and policymakers have stated their lack of support for such a tax. We examined whether political party voting preference and sociodemographic factors affect individuals' support for an SSB tax, and whether message framing affects this support. A nationally representative sample of 1519 Australian adults was recruited for an online experimental survey. Three persuasive frames and one control frame were randomly provided to participants and measures of agreement towards an SSB tax were assessed. Sociodemographic factors and political party preference were also captured. Message framing had minimal effect on the level of support for the tax. However, participants who received the 'supportive of food and drink companies frame' showed the highest positive feelings towards the tax, and participants in rural areas had higher levels of support for an SSB tax when receiving the 'protecting teenagers' frame. Participants who voted for conservative (right-leaning) parties and for Labour (a centre-left party) had similar levels of support towards the tax, which was considerably lower than Greens voters. Undecided voters had the lowest levels of support for the tax, and the frames had limited impact on them. These findings highlight the potential role of message framing in shaping public support for an SSB tax in Australia, particularly in the context of voting preference and sociodemographic factors.
Topics: Adult; Adolescent; Humans; Sugar-Sweetened Beverages; Cross-Sectional Studies; Beverages; Australia; Taxes
PubMed: 38206788
DOI: 10.1093/heapro/daad193 -
Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) Dec 2023Coupling brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) and robotic systems in the future can enable seamless personal assistant systems in everyday life, with the requests that can...
Coupling brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) and robotic systems in the future can enable seamless personal assistant systems in everyday life, with the requests that can be performed in a discrete manner, using one's brain activity only. These types of systems might be of a particular interest for people with locked-in syndrome (LIS) or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) because they can benefit from communicating with robotic assistants using brain sensing interfaces. In this proof-of-concept work, we explored how a wireless and wearable BCI device can control a quadruped robot-Boston Dynamics' Spot. The device measures the user's electroencephalography (EEG) and electrooculography (EOG) activity of the user from the electrodes embedded in the glasses' frame. The user responds to a series of questions with YES/NO answers by performing a brain-teaser activity of mental calculus. Each question-answer pair has a pre-configured set of actions for Spot. For instance, Spot was prompted to walk across a room, pick up an object, and retrieve it for the user (i.e., bring a bottle of water) when a sequence resolved to a YES response. Our system achieved at a success rate of 83.4%. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first integration of wireless, non-visual-based BCI systems with Spot in the context of personal assistant use cases. While this BCI quadruped robot system is an early prototype, future iterations may embody friendly and intuitive cues similar to regular service dogs. As such, this project aims to pave a path towards future developments in modern day personal assistant robots powered by wireless and wearable BCI systems in everyday living conditions.
Topics: Humans; Animals; Dogs; Robotics; Brainwashing; Proof of Concept Study; Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis; Brain
PubMed: 38202942
DOI: 10.3390/s24010080 -
PloS One 2024While metaphors are frequently used to address misconceptions and hesitancy about vaccines, it is unclear how effective they are in health messaging. Using a... (Randomized Controlled Trial)
Randomized Controlled Trial
While metaphors are frequently used to address misconceptions and hesitancy about vaccines, it is unclear how effective they are in health messaging. Using a between-subject, pretest/posttest design, we investigated the impact of explanatory metaphors on people's attitudes toward vaccines. We recruited participants online in the US (N = 301) and asked them to provide feedback on a (fictional) health messaging campaign, which we organized around responses to five common questions about vaccines. All participants completed a 24-item measure of their attitudes towards vaccines before and after evaluating the responses to the five questions. We created three possible response passages for each vaccine question: two included extended explanatory metaphors, and one contained a literal response (i.e., no explanatory metaphors). Participants were randomly assigned to receive either all metaphors or all 'literal' responses. They rated each response on several dimensions and then described how they would answer the target question about vaccines if it were posed by a friend. Results showed participants in both conditions rated most messages as being similarly understandable, informative, and persuasive, with a few notable exceptions. Participants in both conditions also exhibited a similar small-but significant-increase in favorable attitudes towards vaccines from pre- to posttest. Notably, participants in the metaphor condition provided longer free-response answers to the question posed by a hypothetical friend, with different metaphors being reused to different extents and in different ways in their responses. Taken together, our findings suggest that: (a) Brief health messaging passages may have the potential to improve attitudes towards vaccines, (b) Metaphors neither enhance nor reduce this attitude effect, (c) Metaphors may be more helpful than literal language in facilitating further social communication about vaccines.
Topics: Humans; Metaphor; Language; Communication; Attitude
PubMed: 38170715
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0294739 -
Perspectives on Medical Education 2023ChatGPT has been widely heralded as a way to level the playing field in scientific communication through its free language editing service. However, such claims lack...
ChatGPT has been widely heralded as a way to level the playing field in scientific communication through its free language editing service. However, such claims lack systematic evidence. A writing scholar (LL) and six non-native English scholars researching health professions education collaborated on this Writer's Craft to fill this gap. Our overarching aim was to provide experiential evidence about ChatGPT's performance as a language editor and writing coach. We implemented three cycles of a systematic procedure, describing how we developed our prompts, selected text for editing, incrementally prompted to refine ChatGPT's responses, and analyzed the quality of its language edits and explanations. From this experience, we offer five insights, and we conclude that the optimism about ChatGPT's capacity to level the playing field for non-native English writers should be tempered. In the writer's craft section we offer simple tips to improve your writing in one of three areas: Energy, Clarity and Persuasiveness. Each entry focuses on a key writing feature or strategy, illustrates how it commonly goes wrong, teaches the grammatical underpinnings necessary to understand it and offers suggestions to wield it effectively. We encourage readers to share comments on or suggestions for this section on Twitter, using the hashtag: #how'syourwriting?
Topics: Humans; Communication; Language; Persuasive Communication; Writing
PubMed: 38163049
DOI: 10.5334/pme.1246 -
Food Research International (Ottawa,... Jan 2024Amidst rising obesity rates in the EU and the significant public health impact of excessive sugar consumption, the debate on reducing sugar through reformulation with...
Amidst rising obesity rates in the EU and the significant public health impact of excessive sugar consumption, the debate on reducing sugar through reformulation with sweet proteins derived from precision fermentation gains prominence, presenting a viable alternative to traditional sugars and conventional sweeteners. We conducted two studies to investigate the effects of health (emphasizing sugar reduction) versus naturalness (highlighting sweet proteins as alternatives to artificial sweeteners) message framing on the acceptance of products reformulated with sweet proteins. Study 1 (N = 296, Denmark) evaluated the impact of health and naturalness message framing on attitudes towards such reformulations. Study 2, in a cross-cultural sample (N = 3,000 Denmark, Germany, and Poland), tested the mediating role of health perceptions and the moderating effects of BMI and guilt (Study 2a), as well as naturalness perceptions, sweetener use, and pleasure (Study 2b) on product attitudes. Results of Study 1 indicated that healthiness perceptions had a more persuasive influence than naturalness perceptions. The cross-cultural findings of Studies 2a and 2b revealed that BMI, sweetener usage frequency, anticipatory guilt, and pleasure can modulate these effects. These insights suggest that while both perceived healthiness and naturalness shape attitudes towards sweet protein-enriched products, the significance of health perceptions prevails, with anticipatory emotions of guilt enhancing this influence, particularly when sweet proteins substitute added sugar. Such evidence holds substantial implications for strategies aimed at reducing sugar consumption and fostering the acceptance of products containing alternative sweeteners.
Topics: Sugars; Sweetening Agents; Carbohydrates; Europe; Excipients; Dietary Sugars
PubMed: 38129000
DOI: 10.1016/j.foodres.2023.113767 -
Frontiers in Public Health 2023The Chinese state has recently implemented the COVID-19 Vaccine Communication Campaign (CVCC) to counter vaccine hesitancy. Nonetheless, the extant literature that...
INTRODUCTION
The Chinese state has recently implemented the COVID-19 Vaccine Communication Campaign (CVCC) to counter vaccine hesitancy. Nonetheless, the extant literature that examines COVID-19 vaccine acceptance has less represented COVID-19 vaccine communication efforts.
METHODS
To address this lacuna, we qualitatively explored how CVCCs were organized in Chinese communities by investigating 54 Chinese stakeholders.
RESULTS
This study indicates that the CVCC was sustained by top-down political pressure. CVCCs' components involve ideological education among politically affiliated health workers, expanding health worker networks, training health workers, implementing media promotion, communicating with residents using persuasive and explanatory techniques, encouraging multistakeholder partnerships, and using public opinion-steered and coercive approaches. While CVCCs significantly enhanced COVID-19 vaccine acceptance, lacking open communication, stigmatizing vaccine refusers, insufficient stakeholder collaboration, and low trust in the COVID-19 vaccination program (CVP) eroded the validity of CVCCs.
DISCUSSION
To promote the continuity of CVCCs in China, CVCC performers are expected to conduct open and inclusive communication with residents. Furthermore, CVP planers should create robust partnerships among health workers by ensuring their agreements on strategies for implementing CVCCs and optimize COVID-19 immunization service provision to depoliticize CVPs. Our study will not only deepen global audiences' understanding of CVCCs in authoritarian China but also offer potential neighborhood-level solutions for implementing local and global public health communication efforts.
Topics: Humans; COVID-19 Vaccines; COVID-19; Communication; Qualitative Research; China
PubMed: 38098818
DOI: 10.3389/fpubh.2023.1253844 -
Current Opinion in Psychology Feb 2024Bullshitting is characterized by sharing information with little to no regard for truth, established knowledge, or genuine evidence. It involves the use of various... (Review)
Review
Bullshitting is characterized by sharing information with little to no regard for truth, established knowledge, or genuine evidence. It involves the use of various rhetorical strategies to make one's statements sound knowledgeable, impressive, persuasive, influential, or confusing in order to aid bullshitters in explaining things in areas where their obligations to provide opinions exceed their actual knowledge in those domains. Distinct from gullibility (i.e., a propensity to accept a false premise in the presence of untrustworthiness cues), we highlight the research on bullibility (i.e., believing bullshit even in the face of social cues that signal something is bullshit) and its links to erroneous judgments and decisions. A deeper understanding of bullibility is critical to identifying and correcting poor decision-making.
Topics: Humans; Cognition; Judgment; Cues; Persuasive Communication; Language
PubMed: 38091665
DOI: 10.1016/j.copsyc.2023.101769 -
Health Communication Dec 2023This study examined the persuasive effects of two-sided refutational conversion messages compared to one-sided advocacy messages in increasing pro-COVID-19 vaccination...
This study examined the persuasive effects of two-sided refutational conversion messages compared to one-sided advocacy messages in increasing pro-COVID-19 vaccination attitudes and reducing resistance to getting vaccinated among U.S. adults who self-reported as unvaccinated. Results showed that main effects of conversion messages led to significantly higher attitudes but failed to directly reduce resistance toward vaccination. Predicted mediation effects between conversion messages and the dependent variables were found for homophily but were not supported for argument strength. Significant group differences were detected between participants who self-reported as high or low in vaccine hesitancy, for structural equation models that significantly and indirectly led to decreased resistance. Findings show the potential for two-sided conversion messages to be used by public health message designers to affect pro-health outcomes. Implications and limitations of these results and future directions are discussed.
PubMed: 38083877
DOI: 10.1080/10410236.2023.2289280 -
Health Education & Behavior : the... Apr 2024The gap in knowledge and information-seeking between high and low socioeconomic status (SES) has been well documented. This study extends this knowledge gap hypothesis...
The gap in knowledge and information-seeking between high and low socioeconomic status (SES) has been well documented. This study extends this knowledge gap hypothesis to narrative persuasion in the context of parents' knowledge and information-seeking intention concerning adolescents' COVID-19 vaccination. It specifically tests if the gap is moderated by a message type (narrative vs. non-narrative). An online quasi-experiment, with a 2 (participants' education level: high vs. low) × 3 (message type: narrative vs. non-narrative vs. no-message) between-subject design, showed a main effect of education level (i.e., parents with a higher [vs. lower] education level rated a higher intention to seek information and provided more correct answers on questions about adolescents' COVID-19 vaccination) and an interaction between the two factors. The interaction showed that the gap between high- and low-education groups in information-seeking intention disappeared among those who read the narrative or non-narrative, and the gap in knowledge disappeared among those who read the narrative. Study findings suggest the utility of narratives in narrowing the gap in knowledge and information-seeking to improve parents' decisions on child vaccination.
Topics: Child; Humans; Adolescent; Intention; COVID-19 Vaccines; Information Seeking Behavior; COVID-19; Parents; Persuasive Communication; Vaccination; Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice
PubMed: 38078454
DOI: 10.1177/10901981231216742 -
Journal of Physical Therapy Science Dec 2023[Purpose] Trust among patients and clinical suppliers is the foundation for achieving appropriate treatment. This double-blind randomized control trial aimed to...
[Purpose] Trust among patients and clinical suppliers is the foundation for achieving appropriate treatment. This double-blind randomized control trial aimed to determine whether providing patients a pre-treatment physical therapists' introductions and positive appraisal can enhance the trust of patients in therapists. [Participants and Methods] This study included patients diagnosed with lumbar spine spondylosis or non-acute lower back muscle strain who were divided into intervention and control groups. The previously recorded video informed the intervention group patients that they were assigned to our best therapist because of their participation. The primary outcome was evaluated twice, once before and once after the treatment, and the secondary outcome was measured using the second time pain inventory evaluation. [Results] A total of 32 patients participated in this study. No significant difference was found in patients' trust in therapists between the two groups, and a lower successful treatment rate with a higher pain influence level to daily life was noted in the intervention group. [Conclusion] Doctors who offer introductions with a positive assessment of physical therapists cannot change the trust of patients on therapists. Furthermore, this action may risk worse treatment outcomes.
PubMed: 38075515
DOI: 10.1589/jpts.35.802