Detecting and Preventing Defensive Reactions Toward Persuasive Information on Fruit and Vegetable Consumption Using Induced Eye Movements

Objective: Persuasive messages regarding fruit and vegetable consumption often meet defensive reactions from recipients, which may lower message effectiveness. Individual differences in emotion regulation and gender are expected to predict these reactions. In the working memory account of persuasion, inducing voluntary eye movements during the processing of the auditory persuasive information might prevent defensiveness and thereby increase message effectiveness. Methods: Participants in two independently recruited samples from the general population (n = 118 and n = 99) listened to a negatively framed auditory persuasive message advocating fruit and vegetable consumption. Half of them were asked to keep following a regularly moving stimulus on their screen with their eyes. At pretest, the individual differences of cognitive self-affirmation inclination (CSAI) and gender were assessed to predict defensive reactions. Results: In Study 1, induced eye movements significantly increased self-reported consumption after 2 weeks when CSAI was low, but only in males, as indicated by a significant three-way interaction (p <0.001). With negative self-evaluative emotions as dependent variable, this three-way interaction was also significant (p <0.05), suggesting that induced eye movements prevented defensiveness in low CSAI males. Study 2 did not assess consumption but replicated the latter three-way interaction (p <0.05). Conclusion: The studies replicated our earlier findings regarding the moderating effects of individual differences in emotion regulation (i.e., CSAI) on persuasion, but they also revealed gender differences in persuasion that are related to the working memory. The working memory account of persuasion provides new theoretical as well as practical angles on persuasion to target individuals in persuasion to increase fruit and vegetable consumption

Auditory information and its parameters in health persuasion:The development of a tailored smartphone application to support behavior change

While searching for ways to adopt a healthy lifestyle, fruit and vegetables can not be ignored. Consuming sufficient fruit and vegetables has positive health effects and plays a role in the prevention of cancer. Therefore, it is important to investigate how people can be stimulated to take up this behavior. There are new possibilities to present health information; for instance, we can listen to persuasive health information via an Audiobook or interactive smartphone app. This dissertation firstly describes the conditions under which this auditory health information can be effective: for whom is it effective, how does the information need to be formulated? In addition, this research addresses the efficacy of auditory information as presented via a smartphone app. Although there are ten thousands of health apps, the efficacy of such apps has never been tested according to the most strict scientific standard;: a randomized field experiment. The first studies show that it is important how the information is communicated: Aspects of the auditory message, such as intonation and background music, influence the process of health behavior change. In addition, aspects of the listener play a role as well, such as his or her personal involvement. The randomized field experiment showed that after six months of using the interactive fruit and vegetable smartphone app with auditory information and feedback, respondents consumed significantly more fruit. The results were less clear for vegetable consumption. With the gained knowledge in this dissertation, effective smartphone apps can now be created and new research questions and challenges are stimulated in health promotion research

Effects of tailoring ingredients in auditory persuasive health messages on fruit and vegetable intake

Objective: Health messages can be tailored by applying different tailoring ingredients, among which personalisation, feedback and adaptation. This experiment investigated the separate effects of these tailoring ingredients on behaviour in auditory health persuasion. Furthermore, the moderating effect of self-efficacy was assessed.Design: The between-participants design consisted of four conditions. A generic health message served as a control condition; personalisation was applied using the recipient's first name, feedback was given on the personal state, or the message was adapted to the recipient's value.Main outcome measures: The study consisted of a pre-test questionnaire (measuring fruit and vegetable intake and perceived difficulty of performing these behaviours, indicating self-efficacy), exposure to the auditory message and a follow-up questionnaire measuring fruit and vegetable intake two weeks after message exposure (n=112).Results: ANCOVAs showed no main effect of condition on either fruit or vegetable intake, but a moderation was found on vegetable intake: When self-efficacy was low, vegetable intake was higher after listening to the personalisation message. No significant differences between the conditions were found when self-efficacy was high.Conclusion: Individuals with low self-efficacy seemed to benefit from incorporating personalisation, but only regarding vegetable consumption. This finding warrants further investigation in tailoring research

Reading or Listening to a Gain- or Loss-Framed Health Message:Effects of Message Framing and Communication Mode in the Context of Fruit and Vegetable Intake

Gain-framed health messages are found to be more effective when targeting prevention behaviors. However, framing research has only minimally investigated the role of communication mode, another important factor in health communication. This study explored the role of communication mode in interaction with message framing, and the influence of two individual differences related to involvement as conditions under which gain framing can lead to health behavior change. Participants (N = 258) were exposed to either an auditory or written health message concerning fruit and vegetable intake, with either gain- or loss-framed arguments. In addition, the online experiment consisted of baseline and posttest measures, among which intention to consume sufficient fruit and vegetables. Moderating effects of perceived baseline fruit and vegetable consumption and baseline intention were assessed. A significant interaction between message framing and communication mode was observed: In case of a gain-framed message, an auditory message resulted in a higher intention than a written message. This pattern was most explicitly found among those with a lower perceived fruit and vegetable intake at baseline. Although further research is warranted in health persuasion research, the findings can possibly be used to target health interventions better at specific groups of people who behave less healthy

Sociale factoren in de wijkaanpak: Paddepoel:rapportage data-analyse

In dit onderzoek hebben we relevante sociale factoren voor de wijk Paddepoel Noord in Groningen in kaart gebracht. Dit hebben we gedaan aan de hand van een vragenlijst en aanvullend zijn er semigestructureerd interviews gehouden. Dit onderzoek vormt één van de cases in een breder project waarin meerdere cases bestudeerd worden. Het doel van dit bredere project is om, aan de hand van sociale factoren, inzicht te krijgen in de determinanten van succesvolle bewonersparticipatie op wijkniveau

A Mobile Phone App Intervention Targeting Fruit and Vegetable Consumption:The Efficacy of Textual and Auditory Tailored Health Information Tested in a Randomized Controlled Trial

Background: Mobile phone apps are increasingly used to deliver health interventions, which provide the opportunity to present health information via different communication modes. However, scientific evidence regarding the effects of such health apps is scarce. Objective: In a randomized controlled trial, we tested the efficacy of a 6-month intervention delivered via a mobile phone app that communicated either textual or auditory tailored health information aimed at stimulating fruit and vegetable intake. A control condition in which no health information was given was added. Perceived own health and health literacy were included as moderators to assess for which groups the interventions could possibly lead to health behavior change. Methods: After downloading the mobile phone app, respondents were exposed monthly to either text-based or audio-based tailored health information and feedback over a period of 6 months via the mobile phone app. In addition, respondents in the control condition only completed the baseline and posttest measures. Within a community sample (online recruitment), self-reported fruit and vegetable intake at 6-month follow-up was our primary outcome measure. Results: In total, 146 respondents (ranging from 40 to 58 per condition) completed the study (attrition rate 55%). A significant main effect of condition was found on fruit intake (P=.049, partial eta(2)=0.04). A higher fruit intake was found after exposure to the auditory information, especially in recipients with a poor perceived own health (P=.003, partial eta(2)=0.08). In addition, health literacy moderated the effect of condition on vegetable intake 6 months later (P Conclusions: This study provides evidence-based insight into the effects of a mobile health app. The app seems to have the potential to change fruit and vegetable intake up to 6 months later, at least for specific groups. We found different effects for fruit and vegetable intake, respectively, suggesting that different underlying psychological mechanisms are associated with these specific behaviors. Based on our results, it seems worthwhile to investigate additional ways to increase fruit and vegetable intake in recipients with low health literacy

Sociale acceptatie van waterstof: transport, toepassing en opslag

In deze infographic worden de resultaten gedeeld die zijn opgedaan in het Hydelta 2.0 programma (WP10) waar de sociaal-maatschappelijke acceptatie van waterstof binnen de gebouwde omgeving centraal stond. De resultaten zijn gebaseerd op literatuur onderzoek, stakeholder interviews, veldonderzoek en cocreatie sessies. Het belang van communicatiestrategieën (om alle groepen te betrekken), vertrouwen, rechtvaardigheid en veiligheidsperceptie kwam hierin naar voren. Er zijn risico's gedefinieerd die sociale acceptatie kunnen belemmeren, waaronder afnemend draagvlak bij lokale implementatie, het missen van een representatieve groep bewoners en rollen-en verantwoordelijkheidsbepaling. Strategieën voor risicobeheer bij opschaling van de techniek bestaan uit het opstellen van langetermijn-visies en strategieën, het bepalen van relevante informatie per doelgroep, meer centraal verstrekte, doelgroep-gerichte en toegankelijke informatie voor inwoners en een geïntegreerde communicatiestrategie en rolverdeling bij implementatie