Memorable Health Messages on Social Media

Social media is a key source of health messages. Advancing theory of memorable messages (ToMM), we examine the manifest content of memorable health messages received by college students (N = 271) from social media platforms (RQ1) and identify ways in which they perceive those memorable health messages have shaped their health beliefs and behaviors (RQ2). We employ thematic co-occurrence analysis to examine co-occurrences among types of memorable messages and health beliefs and behaviors (RQ3). We denoted two co-occurrence relationships, one relationship (“A”) between universalized health prescriptions and verifying the information and/or making lifestyle changes, and one relationship (“B”) between individualized health encouragement and enhancing health autonomy. An overwhelming majority of memorable messages reported were from creators or influencers that participants did not follow or interact with beforehand, complicating the longstanding assumption that memorable messages emerge primarily from interpersonal relationships. We extend ToMM by conceptualizing memorable messages as platform-mediated communicative artifacts, complicating implicit understandings of message memorability, proposing a normativity-autonomy continuum, and centering health information management practices as mechanisms that might explain how memorable messages shape health beliefs and behaviors.