Trial reportJournal of medical Internet research2014
Personal experiences and emotionality in health-related knowledge exchange in Internet forums: a randomized controlled field experiment comparing responses to facts vs personal experiences.
Trial report in Journal of medical Internet research, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Vaccine hesitancy and behavior change theory-based social media interventions: a systematic review.Translational behavioral medicine · 2022Pooled it
- What Are We Looking for in Computer-Based Learning Interventions in Medical Education? A Systematic Review.Journal of medical Internet research · 2016Pooled it
- Good reasons for bad behavior: a randomized controlled experiment on the impact of narrative reading and writing on empathic concern, perspective-taking, and attitude.Frontiers in public health · 2024Trial
- The Impact of Personality Factors and Preceding User Comments on the Processing of Research Findings on Deep Brain Stimulation: A Randomized Controlled Experiment in a Simulated Online Forum.Journal of medical Internet research · 2016Trial
- Impact of Scientific Versus Emotional Wording of Patient Questions on Doctor-Patient Communication in an Internet Forum: A Randomized Controlled Experiment with Medical Students.Journal of medical Internet research · 2015Trial
- Informational needs related to menstrual literacy among Dutch women: a focus group study.BMC women's health · 2025Article
- Personal experiences bridge moral and political divides better than facts.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2021Article
- Evidence-Based Decision Aid for Patients With Parkinson Disease: Protocol for Interview Study, Online Survey, and Two Randomized Controlled Trials.JMIR research protocols · 2020Article
- "Mommy Blogs" and the Vaccination Exemption Narrative: Results From A Machine-Learning Approach for Story Aggregation on Parenting Social Media Sites.JMIR public health and surveillance · 2016Article
- Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundOn the Internet, people share personal experiences as well as facts and objective information. This also holds true for the exchange of health-related information in a variety of Internet forums. In online discussions about health topics, both fact-oriented and strongly personal contributions occur on a regular basis.
objectiveIn this field experiment, we examined in what way the particular type of contribution (ie, factual information vs personal experiences) has an impact on the subsequent communication in health-related Internet forums.
methodsFor this purpose, we posted parallelized queries to 28 comparable Internet forums; queries were identical with regard to the information contained but included either fact-oriented descriptions or personal experiences related to measles vaccination. In the factual information condition, we posted queries to the forums that contained the neutral summary of a scientific article. In the personal experiences condition, we posted queries to the forums that contained the same information as in the first condition, but were framed as personal experiences
resultsWe found no evidence that personal experiences evoked more responses (mean 3.79, SD 3.91) from other members of the Internet forums than fact-oriented contributions (mean 2.14, SD 2.93, t26=0.126, P=.219). But personal experiences elicited emotional replies (mean 3.17, SD 1.29) from other users to a greater extent than fact-oriented contributions (mean 2.13, SD 1.29, t81=3.659, P<.001).
conclusionsWe suggest that personal experiences elicited more emotional replies due to the process of emotional anchoring of people's own style of communication. We recommend future studies should aim at testing the hypotheses with more general and with less emotionally charged topics, constructing different fact-oriented posts, and examining additional potential factors of influence such as personality factors or particular communication situations.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.