2024/06/18 by Špela Dolinšek, Christin Scholz, Stefano Giani +3 · 1 voice · 6 citations
Arts and Humanities · Psychology · Social Sciences · #Applied psychology #Behavioral Health and Interventions #Computer science #Consistency (knowledge bases) #Health communication #Media Influence and Health #Mental health #Misinformation and Its Impacts #Political science #Psychiatry #Psychological intervention #Psychology #Psychotherapist #Realm #Social psychology #Unintended consequences #Well-being
paper · doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2024.117060
published in Social Science & Medicine 353, 117060 (Elsevier BV)
openalex publication_date 2024/06/18 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
Emerging evidence in health communication and psychology suggests that a) exposure to specific persuasive health messages can have unintended effects on the mental well-being of recipients and b) recipients' mental well-being before exposure can influence message processing. Available evidence regarding the relationship between mental well-being and exposure to specific health messages lacks consistency and is scattered across different fields. This scoping review of 24 publications summarizes what is known about mental health effects in health communication and provides a research agenda for future work. Among others, key findings suggest that particularly negative emotional appeals may have broad, negative effects on indicators of hedonic well-being. Further, humor and gain appeals may positively impact mental well-being, although positive message features are strongly understudied in this space. Lower mental well-being prior to message exposure may impact message processing, but not necessarily message effectiveness. We find that potential well-being effects of health communication have been largely ignored, especially outside the realm of mental health research. Yet, initial evidence does underline the importance of such inquiry. This review summarizes initial evidence of systematic, unintended effects of health messaging on mental well-being and highlights fruitful avenues for future work in this space.