Surrogate Seekers Of Online Health Information In China:Their Attitudes,Health Locus Of Control Beliefs,and Information Sharing Behavior

The aim is to improve the quality of online health user information service,and provide personalized information support and emotional support to users who have health information needs,so as to help others obtain high quality health information,improve health literacy,make scientific decisions and effectively deal with health problems.This study takes surrogate seeking behavior as the research subject,based on the theory of planned behavior theory and health locus of control beliefs,analysis of their attitude toward online health information,health locus of control beliefs,and their surrogate seeking and health information sharing behaviors.The data source designed the questionnaire,and the convenient sampling method was adopted.A total of 781 questionnaires were collected,of which 644 were valid,with an effective recovery of82.5%.Hierarchy regression was used to analyze the factors influencing the health information seeking behavior and health information sharing behavior of surrogates.Results showed that about 84.9% of the surrogate seekers indicated they had sought information on behalf of their parents,and about 74.8% of the surrogate seekers searched for online health information for other relatives(excluding parents,spouses and children).Controlling for demographic variables,education(β =0.24,P <0.05),being married(β =0.35,P <0.001)and being a family caregiver(β =0.08,P <0.05)have a positive effect on surrogate seeking behavior.Perceived barriers to online health information seeking(β =-0.08,p<0.05)have a significant negative impact on surrogate seeking behavior.Among the predictors,the perceived benefits of online health information seeking(β = 0.21,p<0.001)and internal health control points(β = 0.28,p<0.001)have a significant positive impact on information sharing behavior with family and friends;powerful others(β =-0.15,p<0.01)have a significant negative impact on the information sharing behavior with family and friends.The factors predicting information sharing online behavior were health status(β =0.20,P <0.05),perceived benefits of information(β =0.20,P <0.001),internal health control points(β=0.10,p<0.05),and powerful others(β=0.11,p<0.05).Implications of mobilizing and facilitating family support to enhance medical knowledge building and health decision making were discussed.