Health websites which feature advertising and pharmaceutical sponsorship are perceived to be less trustworthy and have less impact on users, according to new research from Northumbria University.
A study, published in this month’s Journal of Medical Internet Research[i], claims that irrelevant images and advertising can negatively influence the user’s response to the information provided.
The study exposed 85 women who have different levels of alcohol consumption to a website containing high quality information on the associated risk of breast cancer. Both websites gave the same information but one site contained positive trustmarks whereas the other contained negative “cues” including adverts, sponsorship and a donation button.
The cues did not affect the length of time spent reading the information. However, one week later the site with the positive cues was found to have promoted greater alcohol reduction than the site with the negative cues among women who had previously reported drinking more heavily.
Professor Pam Briggs, Dean of the School of Psychology and Sport Sciences at Northumbria University is Principal Investigator on the research project, which was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. She will present these and other findings at the first World Health Summit in Berlin next week as part of a session exploring the ‘e-patient’ .
The World Health Summit, involving more than 600 leading political decision-makers, researchers, scientists and industry representatives, will seek to find solutions to global health care challenges. It is being supported by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
Professor Briggs said: “Increasingly, patients are turning to the Internet as their first source of health information and advice. In our work we’ve already shown that design and visual appeal of a site will affect the extent to which people will read the health message there, but this is the first time that we have been able to show that seemingly inconsequential design changes can exert longer-term influences on health behaviour.”
* Full bibliographic information[i] The Journal of Medical Internet Research – October 2009.
Harris PR, Sillence E, Briggs P, (2009). The Effect of Credibility-Related Design Cues on Responses to a Web-Based Message About the Breast Cancer Risks From Alcohol: Randomized Controlled Trial. J Med Internet Res 2009;11(3):e37
Source: Northumbria University
