A thematic analysis of messages posted by moderators within health-related asynchronous online support forums

Abstract

Objective: To identify and describe the activities performed by online support community moderators.Methods: A total of 790 messages were downloaded for analysis. Messages were written by 59 moderators from 6 forums that represent a diverse range of conditions (arthritis, complex regional pain syndrome, Crohn's disease, depression, diabetes and Huntington's disease).Results: Thematic analysis revealed four themes: supportive tasks involve providing help to members, moderators sharing experiences shows how they use forums to fulfil their own personal support needs, making announcements about new discoveries and upcoming events, and administrative tasks such as enforcing rules and deleting spam. Conclusion:These results are consistent with the helper-therapy principle and provide a new insight into the diverse and varied range of activities carried out by moderators.Practice implications: Moderators perform many roles, including using forums for their own support needs.

Genetic testing for Huntington’s disease: A thematic analysis of online support community messages

“…As a consequence of this modest data set, the extent to which the findings can be generalised may be limited. Second, while men and women have an equal risk of HD (Frank, 2014) and women are slightly more likely to undergo predictive testing (Baig et al, 2016), the data used in this study were predominantly from women, which is consistent with the findings of other forum studies (Coulson et al, 2016; Smedley and Coulson, 2017). The reasons for this gender imbalance are not clearly understood.…”

Emotional adjustment post-stroke: A qualitative study of an online stroke community

“…This was down to the geographical separation of forum users, limiting social support types requiring face to face interaction such as loaning, provision of tasks and active participation. 36 On the other side, the 'comfortable emotional distance' provided by the forum worked as an enabler for the interaction with peers online. 37 Due to the public nature of posts on the forum, promises of confidentiality were also not possible, despite this being relevant to emotional wellbeing.…”

A practical guide to analysing online support forums

“…Other studies collect data from diverse forums to examine broader issues that may apply across all forums rather than being specific to a particular health condition, such as looking at the activities performed by moderators (Smedley & Coulson, 2017) or investigating the potential disadvantages of using forums (van Uden-Kraan, Drossaert, Taal, Lebrun, et al, 2008). Other considerations may include how many members participate in each forum, how many messages have been posted, and whether the forum is active or dormant.…”

“…For example, researchers have used forums to examine the self-care of health conditions (Malik & Coulson, 2011;Smedley et al, 2015), why people use online support (Coulson, 2013;Coulson et al, 2016), how individuals engage with forums (Smedley, Coulson, Gavin, Rodham, & Watts, 2016), the types of support exchanged (Coulson, Buchanan, & Aubeeluck, 2007;Coursaris & Liu, 2009), the empowering effects of taking part (Mo & Coulson, 2012;van Uden-Kraan, Drossaert, Taal, Seydel, & van de Laar, 2009), the experiences of moderators (Coulson & Shaw, 2013;Smedley & Coulson, 2017), and a range of other important topics.…”