Start Date
10-12-2017 12:00 AM
Description
We build an online social support model of self-care behavior for patients of stigmatized chronic diseases. We conceptualize three dimensions of informational support namely objective information, experiential information, and crowd consensus, and hypothesize their positive effect on self-care behavior. We conceptualize three dimensions of emotional support namely emotional tone, self-disclosure, and community involvement, and hypothesize their positive effect on self-care behavior. We also hypothesize how these dimensions interact with each other in promoting self-care behavior. Using data from 31,132 threads from an online health community for HIV patients, we test our hypotheses using Tobit regression. We find statistically significant support for our hypotheses, except for the interaction of experiential and objective information on self-care. Contrary to our hypotheses, we find that self-disclosure is negatively associated with self-care behavior. Our findings have important implications for management of stigmatized chronic diseases.
Recommended Citation
Wang, Xunyi; Parameswaran, Srikanth; Bagul, Darshan; and Kishore, Rajiv, "Does Online Social Support Work in Stigmatized Chronic Diseases? A Study of the Impacts of Different Facets of Informational and Emotional Support on Self-Care Behavior in an HIV Online Forum" (2017). ICIS 2017 Proceedings. 22.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2017/General/Presentations/22
Does Online Social Support Work in Stigmatized Chronic Diseases? A Study of the Impacts of Different Facets of Informational and Emotional Support on Self-Care Behavior in an HIV Online Forum
We build an online social support model of self-care behavior for patients of stigmatized chronic diseases. We conceptualize three dimensions of informational support namely objective information, experiential information, and crowd consensus, and hypothesize their positive effect on self-care behavior. We conceptualize three dimensions of emotional support namely emotional tone, self-disclosure, and community involvement, and hypothesize their positive effect on self-care behavior. We also hypothesize how these dimensions interact with each other in promoting self-care behavior. Using data from 31,132 threads from an online health community for HIV patients, we test our hypotheses using Tobit regression. We find statistically significant support for our hypotheses, except for the interaction of experiential and objective information on self-care. Contrary to our hypotheses, we find that self-disclosure is negatively associated with self-care behavior. Our findings have important implications for management of stigmatized chronic diseases.