ArticleInformation processing & management2021
From information seeking to information avoidance: Understanding the health information behavior during a global health crisis.
Article in Information processing & management, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 162 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
162 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- The Relationships among Anxiety, Subjective Well-Being, Media Consumption, and Safety-Seeking Behaviors during the COVID-19 Epidemic.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Pooled it
- Effects of Exposure to Conflicting Health Information on Topic-Specific Information Sharing and Seeking Intentions.Health communication · 2025Trial
- Understanding the Impact of Communicating Uncertainty About COVID-19 in the News: Randomized Between-Subjects Factorial Experiment.Journal of medical Internet research · 2024Trial
- Effect of a Brief Web-Based Educational Intervention on Willingness to Consider Human Papillomavirus Vaccination for Children in Japan: Randomized Controlled Trial.Journal of medical Internet research · 2021Trial
- Age-Related Patterns in Health Literacy and Health Information-Seeking Behavior in a Korean Population: Cross-Sectional Study.JMIR public health and surveillance · 2026Article
- The relationship between college students' social media use and core self-evaluation: the chain mediating effect of information overload and fear of missing out.BMC psychiatry · 2026Article
- Driving Revisit Intentions Through Medical Information and Service Quality in General Hospitals: An Extended Technology Acceptance Model Approach.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- From information overload to health information avoidance among Chinese adults aged 50 years and above: the association of self-perceptions of aging and techno-exhaustion.BMC psychology · 2026Article
- Structural Relationships Among Marketing Stimuli, Pleasure Emotion, Trust in Seller, and Impulsive Buying in Sports Livestreaming E-Commerce: Evidence from University Students in Eastern China.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Navigating Diabetes Management in the Digital Era: Scoping Review of Online Health Information-Seeking Behavior.Journal of medical Internet research · 2026Article
- Article
- Comparative research on the influence of incidental exposure to negative fertility-related information on Chinese nulliparous women's fertility intention.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Investigating Oral Health Information Avoidance Among Chinese Young Adults: The Roles of Subjective Norms, Message Fatigue, and Loss Aversion-A Cross-Sectional Study.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Health Information Seeking Behavior Among American Indian and Alaska Native Peoples.American journal of health promotion : AJHP · 2026Article
- The relationship between public health emergencies and suicidal ideation: the mediating role of fear of missing out and the moderating role of conscientiousness.BMC psychology · 2026Article
- From Searching to Coping, How Chinese Patients With Breast Cancer Navigate Web-Based Health Information: Semistructured Interview Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2026Article
- Digital nursing: from misinformation to protagonism in public health.Investigacion y educacion en enfermeria · 2026Article
- Experiences and coping strategies among patients with mild COVID-19 who develop post COVID conditions at a primary care centre.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Article
- The impact of health information exposure frequency on youth sleep quality under algorithmic recommendation: a serial mediation role of information anxiety and self-efficacy.Frontiers in public health · 2026Article
102 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Individuals seek information for informed decision-making, and they consult a variety of information sources nowadays. However, studies show that information from multiple sources can lead to information overload, which then creates negative psychological and behavioral responses. Drawing on the Stimulus-Organism-Response (S-O-R) framework, we propose a model to understand the effect of information seeking, information sources, and information overload (Stimuli) on information anxiety (psychological organism), and consequent behavioral response, information avoidance during the global health crisis (COVID-19). The proposed model was tested using partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) for which data were collected from 321 Finnish adults using an online survey. People found to seek information from traditional sources such as mass media, print media, and online sources such as official websites and websites of newspapers and forums. Social media and personal networks were not the preferred sources. On the other hand, among different information sources, social media exposure has a significant relationship with information overload as well as information anxiety. Besides, information overload also predicted information anxiety, which further resulted in information avoidance.
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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.