JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Compared with older cancer caregivers, young adult cancer caregivers (YACC) experience greater stress and depression during the first six months of caregiving. However, social support can buffer the negative psychological effects associated with cancer caregiving. Social media (SM) is one avenue through which YACC often seek social support. However, toxic positivity— the excessive and ineffective overgeneralization of a positive state even in the worst circumstances—is a potential danger of SM and may contribute to further distress.

Objective:

The purpose of this study was to examine the social media posts of YACC to describe how toxic positivity manifests in YACC discourse on social media.

Methods:

In this secondary analysis, the cancer-related SM posts (N = 760) of 34 YACC were extracted for six months from the day of cancer diagnosis and imported into NVivo qualitative analysis software. Open coding of posts from N = 4 YACC identified a pattern in which posts may have been insensitive or dismissive of others’ emotions. Similar posts were grouped together, forming categories of toxic positivity which were used to create a codebook and code all remaining posts.

Results:

Content analysis identified three main categories of toxic positivity in YACC’s SM posts: supplications (n = 251, 33%), prevailing (n = 7, 10.1%), and platitudes (n = 16, 2.1%). Supplications involved prayer or trust in god, prevailing posts compared dealing with cancer to a fight and suggested that the person with cancer would prevail, and platitudes used outdated, overused, and or disingenuous phrases meant to comfort.

Conclusions:

Findings suggest that when YACC use SM during cancer experiences they may encounter a culture of toxic positivity. Among acquaintances, SM may be best suited for instrumental support (e.g. transportation to appointments, meal preparation) rather than emotional support.