Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Research Protocols
Date Submitted: Nov 25, 2020
Open Peer Review Period: Nov 24, 2020 - Dec 8, 2020
Date Accepted: Feb 25, 2021
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
Reactance to social authority in entertainment-education (E-E) media: study protocol for an online randomized controlled trial
ABSTRACT
Background:
Entertainment-education (E-E) media can be an effective strategy for influencing health behaviors. To improve E-E effectiveness, we investigate if the social authority of a person delivering a health message arouses motivation to reject that message—a phenomenon known as reactance. Using a short, animated video, we measure reactance to a sugar reduction message that is narrated by a child (low social authority), the child’s mother (equivalent social authority to the target audience), and the family physician (high social authority).
Objective:
This study aims to 1) determine the effect of the narrator’s social authority on reactance to the sugar reduction message; 2) establish the video’s effectiveness in improving behavioral intent to reduce the intake of added sugars; and 3) quantify participant’s interest in watching the E-E intervention video.
Methods:
This is a parallel group, randomized controlled trial comparing an intervention video narrated by a (i) low, (ii) equivalent, or (iii) high social authority against an (iv) attention placebo control video, and a (v) control video. The primary outcomes will include measures of antecedents of reactance, its components, and its attitudinal and behavioral outcomes. For our secondary outcome, we will assess participant engagement with the sugar intervention videos. We will leverage a regression framework to analyze online data collected from 4,000 English-speaking participants aged 18 to 59 years.
Results:
The study received ethics approval from the Heidelberg University’s Ethics Committee on March 18th, 2020 (S-088/2020). The participant recruitment and data collection were completed in December 2020. The data analysis is planned to be finished in February 2021 and the final results are planned to be published by April 2021.
Conclusions:
This trial will utilize several randomization procedures, list experimentation methods, and new online technologies to investigate the effect of social authority on reactance to a persuasive health message. Our results will inform the design of future E-E videos for public health promotion needs. Clinical Trial: This study was registered at the German Clinical Trials Register (www.drks.de) on July 24th, 2020: DRKS00022340.
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