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1、Promoting Health Literacy Using Interactive Web Technologies: Examining the Effects of Interactivity on Comprehension Using an Individual Differences Perspective (Research Design and Preliminary Results)Mia Liza A. Lustria Doctoral Student, College of Communications and Information Studies Universit
2、y of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky. Email: m.lustriauky.eduPresented at ASIST 2004 Annual Meeting; “Managing and Enhancing Information: Cultures and Conflicts“ (ASIST AM 04), Providence, Rhode Island, November 13 - 18, 2004 ABSTRACTurrent enthusiasm for the Internet as a health communication tool is
3、 based on its growing popularity as a source of health information and on widespread assumptions about the capacity of interactive technologies to provide active environments for health education and promotion. However, before the Internets potential can be fully realized, Rice and Katz (2001) write
4、 that it is important that “the insights of social science research need to be brought to bear on the new systems as they are configured, made available, implemented and used.” Interactivity has been pinpointed as the key feature of Internet technologies that make it a potentially powerful health co
5、mmunication tool. Combined with its capacity to disseminate information to mass audiences, Internet technologies also carry the persuasive qualities traditionally attributed to interpersonal channels. Heralded as a “hybrid channel” (Cassell, 1998) interactive technologies do not only have the capaci
6、ty to disseminate information widely but also to provide individualized messages, and to promote active processing of information. However, there is still a dearth of theoretically-driven empirical studies providing support for or against this assumption. Reviews of interactive health interventions
7、have found that these technologies were at times “superior to and at times no better than other media with respect to educational and health outcomes” (Street, 1997). Aside from methodological issues, another view explaining these mixed findings is that the communicative efficacy of interactive tech
8、nologies might be influenced more by their match with comprehension processes than with the interactivity of the presentation media itself (Aldrich, Rogers, Narayanan as well as the design of the main online questionnaire. Interactivity was operationally defined as the inclusion or non-inclusion of
9、features that promote active user control (e.g., navigational tools, internal hyperlinks, interactive quizzes, interactive activities, and nonlinear hypertext structure) and features that were visually stimulating (e.g., graphics and animation). The websites that were created were put through a batt
10、ery of manipulation checks to ensure that the subjects would detect significant differences between the two stimulus materials.The instruments were pretested on 75 students at computer labs on a large Southeastern university during the Summer session of 2004. The test subjects were Crandomly exposed
11、 to either the high interactivity site and the low interactivity site and then asked to answer the pretest questionnaire. All instruments were administered online. The results of the pretest showed that the test subjects were able to perceive a significant difference in interactivity between the hig
12、h interactivity site and the low interactivity site. The findings of the pretest served as the basis for improving the study materials and streamlining the study instrument.The final and third phase of the project will involve a web experiment using a 2 x 2 factorial design to relate level of intera
13、ctivity of websites, need for cognition, and comprehension scores. The web experiment will be administered on two sample groups in two different locations. The main sample will consist of 350 college students at a large Southeastern university in the United States. A second comparison group will con
14、sist of 200 college students at a large university in the Philippines. Exposure to the two main stimulus materials will again be randomized. Subjects will be instructed to explore either the high interactivity site or the low interactivity site on the premise that they are seeking information for a
15、friend or family member who has recently been diagnosed with skin cancer. After exploring the site, they will be required to accomplish a survey that will help measure their comprehension scores, need for cognition scores, and other items, such as general health information seeking behavior, Interne
16、t usage, computer competence, perceived interactivity of the site, attitudes towards the site, and behavioral intentions. Data will be analyzed using appropriate descriptive and inferential statistics via the SPSS program. The main hypotheses will be tested using a two-way analysis of variance to determine main and interaction effects between independent and dependent variables.The main research hypotheses that
