JMIR public health and surveillance
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JMIR Public Health Surveill · Oct 2017
Online Influence and Sentiment of Fitness Tweets: Analysis of Two Million Fitness Tweets.
Publicly available fitness tweets may provide useful and in-depth insights into the real-time sentiment of a person's physical activity and provide motivation to others through online influence. ⋯ The results of this research suggest that the users of mobile fitness apps who share their workouts via Twitter have a lower Klout Score than the general Twitter user and that users who chose to share additional insights into their workouts are more positive in sentiment than negative. We present a novel perspective into the physical activity messaging from within mobile fitness apps that are then shared over Twitter. By moving beyond the numbers and evaluating both the Twitter user and the emotions tied to physical activity, future research could analyze additional relationships between the user's online influence, the enjoyment of the physical activity, and with additional analysis a long-term retention strategy for the use of a fitness app.
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JMIR Public Health Surveill · Oct 2017
Twitter and Public Health (Part 2): Qualitative Analysis of How Individual Health Professionals Outside Organizations Use Microblogging to Promote and Disseminate Health-Related Information.
Twitter is the most popular form of microblogging that is being utilized in public health to engage audiences and to communicate health-related information. Although there is some research showing the various forms of Twitter use in public health, little is known about how individual public health professionals are using their personal Twitter accounts to disseminate health information. ⋯ Using Twitter, public health professionals are helping dispel misinformation through education and by translating technical research into lay terms, advocating for health inequalities, and using it as a means to promote professional development.