Article: Relevance criteria for health information on a health discussion forum: An analysis of user eye movements
Pian, W., Khoo, C.S.G., & Chang, Y.K. (2016). The criteria people use in relevance decisions on health information: An analysis of user eye movements when browsing a health discussion forum. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 18(6):e136. (Available at: http://www.jmir.org/2016/6/e136/) Abstract Background: People are increasingly accessing health-related social media sites, such as health discussion forums, to post and read user-generated health information. It is important to know what criteria people use when deciding the relevance of information found on health social media websites, in different situations. Objective: The study attempted to identify the relevance criteria that people use when browsing a health discussion forum, in 3 types of use contexts: when seeking information for their own health issue, when seeking for other people’s health issue, and when browsing without a particular health issue in mind. Method: A total of 58 study participants were self-assigned to 1 of the 3 information...
Article: Comparison of drug information on consumer drug review sites versus authoritative health information websites
Chew, S.H., & Khoo, C.S.G. (2015 early view). Comparison of drug information on consumer drug review sites versus authoritative health information websites. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology.(Available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/asi.23390/abstract) Abstract Huge amounts of health-related information of different types are available on the Web. In addition to authoritative health information sites maintained by government health departments and healthcare institutions, there are many social media sites carrying user-contributed information. This study sought to identify the types of drug information available on consumer-contributed drug review sites compared to authoritative drug information websites—what types of drug information are common and unique, and how they differ in nature, detail and usefulness. Content analysis was carried out on the information available for nine drugs on three authoritative sites (RxList, eMC and PDRhealth), as well as three drug review sites (WebMD, RateADrug and PatientsLikeMe). The types of information found on authoritative...
Article: Relevance judgment when browsing a health discussion forum: Content analysis of eye fixations
Pian, W., Khoo, C.S.G., & Chang, Y.K. (2014). Relevance judgment when browsing a health discussion forum: Content analysis of eye fixations. LIBRES, 24(2), 132-147. (Available at: http://libres-ejournal.info/1408/) Abstract Introduction. People are increasingly searching and browsing for health information on social media sites. This is a small study of the relevance criteria used by laypersons when browsing a health discussion forum under three conditions—when seeking information for their own health issue, for a friend’s or relative’s health issue, and with no particular issue in mind. Method. An eye-tracker system was used to identify what text users’ eyes were fixated on when browsing post surrogates and post content on a health discussion forum. Eye-fixations indicated the text segments that the user’s attention was focused on when making relevance judgments. Analysis. Content analysis was performed on the text segments with eye-fixation, to identify the types of information they contain. These types of...