. Neethu George; . D. Rock Britto; . Vaduva Krishnan; . L. Manoj Dass; . H. A. Prasant; . V. Aravindhan
Volume 8, Issue 9 , September 2018, , Pages 1-8
Abstract
INTRODUCTION: The use of social media to disseminate major communications, particularly forcampaigns related to days of health importance, is becoming much popular. The use of Twitter,Instagram, ...
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INTRODUCTION: The use of social media to disseminate major communications, particularly forcampaigns related to days of health importance, is becoming much popular. The use of Twitter,Instagram, and Facebook is gaining an integral place in public life online with hashtag campaigns.OBJECTIVES: The objectives of this study were to assess the characteristics of hashtag campaignsrelated to health in social media and to compare three different campaigns in three commonly usedsocial media platforms, namely, Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.METHODOLOGY: This was a cross‑sectional study which analyzed contents of three health‑relatedcampaigns in Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. The campaigns were #let’s talk (World Health day2017), Hands up #HIV prevention (World AIDS day 2016), and #No tobacco (World No Tobacco Day2017). Public posts related to each were searched from three platforms and assessed separately.Source, publicity, credibility, reach outs, and other characteristics were assessed among eachcampaign and comparison was also done among the three social media.RESULTS: Out of 812 posts, 507 (62.4%) were related to the study. Facebook posts were morerelated (67.33%), popular (45.05%), and authenticated (28.22%). Among the campaigns, # let’s talkwas more credible (96.33%) and authenticated (33.94%). Also in that, 57.79% from individual sourceand 79.82% were awareness related.CONCLUSION: Posts in social media related to hashtag campaigns are more credible, related, andless popular. These factors have to be considered for the campaigns to become an effective tool.
