The Effect of Monetary Incentives on Health Care Social Media Content: Study Based on Topic Modeling and Sentiment Analysis (Preprint)

Abstract

BACKGROUND Seeking online health information (OHI) has become a habit of investigating one's health condition. As of July 2022, the global social media, one of the main OHI resources, user base has reached 59% of the world's total population. While social media could provide high-quality health information, low-quality pieces also can be found on these platforms, e.g., online misinformation. Distinguishing high from low-quality health information is a major problem on social media platforms and remains an issue that has not been sufficiently addressed in healthcare communities. OBJECTIVE The quality of health-related information posted on social media has been a significant concern. Providing incentives for good content could be one approach to improve this. This study empirically investigates the effect of incentive mechanisms in social media on the quality of health-related content. METHODS Based on a large sample of health-related social media posts from each of an incentive-based (Steemit) and traditional (Reddit), platform, we explore differences across three dimensions: (a) emotion and tone, (b) topic similarity and difference, and (c) the extent to which these resemble clickbait. RESULTS The incentive mechanism in play likely motivated health-related posts that are more informational. We also find differences in emotion, tone, and the extent to which posts are created as potential ‘clickbait' content. CONCLUSIONS It is increasingly important to ensure high-quality health content on social media, particularly as more users gravitate toward using these platforms for health-related information. Monetary incentives - used in other domains successfully - could play a role here, and the exploratory comparison of Steemit and Reddit shows systematic differences in health-related content that offer important insights to improve the quality of content. Therefore, Incentive-based social media could have the potential to provide more informational health-related content, which may also be more diverse. CLINICALTRIAL This survey was conducted under protocols approved by the University of South Florida Institutional Review Board (IRB) (STUDY\#003306: "Investing the drivers of currency in blockchain social platforms")