The effects of situated learning and health knowledge involvement on health communications

BACKGROUND: Many patients use websites, blogs, or online social communities to gain health knowledge, information about disease symptoms, and disease diagnosis opinions. The purpose of this study is to use the online platform of blogs to explore whether the framing effect of information content, situated learning of information content, and health knowledge involvement would affect health communication between doctors and patients and further explore whether this would increase patient willingness to seek treatment. METHODS: This study uses a survey to collect data from patient subjects who have used online doctor blogs or patients who have discussed medical information with doctors on blogs. The number of valid questionnaire samples is 278, and partial least square is used to conduct structural equation model analysis. RESULTS: Research results show that situated learning and health knowledge involvement have a positive effect on health communication. The negative framing effect and health knowledge involvement would also affect the patient’s intention to seek medical help. In addition, situated learning and health knowledge involvement would affect the intention to seek medical help through communication factors. CONCLUSIONS: Blogs are important communication channels between medical personnel and patients that allow users to consult and ask questions without time limitations and enable them to obtain comprehensive health information. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/1742-4755-11-93) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.