Investigating Relationships Between Health-Related Problems and Online Health Information Seeking

Abstract

Online health information seeking (OHIS) functions as a coping strategy to relieve health-related stress and problems. When people rate their health as poor or felt concern about their health, they frequently visit the Internet to seek health-related information in order to understand their symptoms and treatments. Regarding this role of OHIS, it is important to understand the relationships between health-related problems and OHIS. This study applies the Common-Sense Model as a theoretical lens to examine the relationship between health-related problems (ie, diagnosis of cancer, poor self-rated health, and psychological distress) and OHIS of adults in the US. Using the Health Information National Trends Survey 4 Cycle 1 (2012), a total of 2351 adult Internet users was included in this research. Hierarchical logistic regression analyses were conducted to examine the research model, and the model adding psychological distress resulted in a statistically significant improvement in model fit. In this study, lower levels of self-rated health and higher levels of psychological distress were significantly associated with higher odds of OHIS. Study findings support the idea that individuals' low levels of self-rated health and high levels of perceived psychological distress make people search for health-related information via the Internet in order to cope with health-related concern and distress.

Correlation between Google Trends on dengue fever and national surveillance report in Indonesia

“…Nevertheless, the accuracy of keyword or search term identification depends on information-seeking behavior which are influenced by media trends, outbreak news briefs, disease occurrence, and Internet penetration [8,9,10,11,13,15,16,23]. Information-seeking behavior also is influenced by individual variables such as age, sex, level of education, cultural aspect, language, social class, marital status, level of healthcare utilization, and level of stress [23,25,26,27]. An additional factor that drives the information-seeking behavior is keyword suggestion in Google.…”

Prediction of health information-seeking behavior components based on health anxiety among users of public libraries

“…[121337] In addition, individuals with high levels of health anxiety are exposed to disturbing and confusing information; hence, they use a variety of health information sources to find a sense of tranquility and confidence. [20] Moreover, it can be claimed that in order to better understand their health; interact with the doctor; learn more about diseases, treatments, and medications prescribed; and decide on referral to a doctor,[12] people with high health anxiety perform seeking more purposefully and seek for health information such as symptoms associated with illnesses, different treatment strategies, drug prescription, and awareness of nutrition-related issues.…”

“…[1618] It can also be said that when people are exposed to stresses and concerns about their health status, and their minds are engaged with illness-related concerns, in order to track their health status and eliminate these concerns, they seek health information through various sources of information such as newspapers, TVs, the Internet, radios, and health-care professionals. [37]…”

“…In other words, the higher the individuals' health anxiety level, the more frequent reliable searches they perform and the various health information sources (such as the Internet, books, referrals to doctors, questions from others, and newspapers) they use in order to eliminate their concerns and reduce their fears and to check their health status. [3740] This could also be indicative of the increasing public awareness of health issues, as well as the increasing importance of information resources and the role of these resources in preventing the onset and diagnosis of illnesses, the health of individuals, and the reduction of medical expenses. [5]…”

An Exploratory Study Of Facebook Intensity And Its Links To Narcissism, Stress, And Self-esteem

“…The internet is often used by those experiencing health-related stress and problems and to seek health-related information in order to understand their symptoms and treatments [15]. Facebook is often used for seeking social support and research has shown that if the support was perceived in adolescents, this decreased their depressed moods, however, if not perceived, this had adverse effects and increased their depressed moods [1].…”