Fight Like a Nerdy Girl: The Dear Pandemic Playbook for Combating Health Misinformation

Calleja N AbdAllah A Abad N , et al. A public health research agenda for managing infodemics: methods and results of the first WHO infodemiology conference. JMIR Infodemiology. 2021;1(1):e30979. doi:10.2196/30979. eCollection Jan-Dec 2021.

Dr. Christakis’ interview with NPR available at the website: the enduring impact of COVID-19. https://www.npr.org/2020/10/26/927796954/the-enduring-impact-of-covid-19. Updated October 29, 2020. Accessed October 27, 2021.

World Health Organization . Immunizing the Public against Misinformation. https://www.who.int/news-room/feature-stories/detail/immunizing-the-public-against-misinformation. Updated August 25, 2020. Accessed October 27, 2021.

U.S. Surgeon General’s Office, Department of Health and Human Services . Confronting Health Misinformation: The U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory on Building a Healthy Information Environment. https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/surgeon-general-misinformation-advisory.pdf. Updated July 15, 2021. Accessed October 27, 2021.

Purnat TD Vacca P Czerniak C , et al. Infodemic signal detection during the COVID-19 pandemic: development of a methodology for identifying potential information voids in online conversations. JMIR Infodemiology. 2021;1(1):e30971. doi:10.2196/30971.

Frost H Campbell P Maxwell M , et al. Effectiveness of motivational interviewing on adult behaviour change in health and social care settings: a systematic review of reviews. PLoS One. 2018;13(10):e0204890. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0204890.

Centers for Disease Control, Department of Health and Human Services . Crisis and emergency risk communication (CERC) manual: community engagement. 2018 update. https://emergency.cdc.gov/cerc/ppt/CERC_CommunityEngagement.pdf. Accessed October 27, 2021.

Ritter AZ Aronowitz S Leininger L , et al. Dear pandemic: nurses as key partners in fighting the COVID-19 infodemic. Public Health Nurs. 2021;38(4):603-609. doi:10.1111/phn.12903.

A nice empirical example: Berger J Milkman KL . What makes online content viral? J Market Res. 2012;49(2):192-205.

Wright S Neimand A Steinman M . Finding the right messenger for your message. Stanford Soc Innovat Rev website. https://ssir.org/articles/entry/finding_the_right_messenger_for_your_message#. Published May 6, 2021. Accessed October 27, 2021.

Rotolo SM Jain S Dhaon S , et al. A coordinated strategy to develop and distribute infographics addressing COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and misinformation. J Am Pharm Assoc. 2021;S1544-S3191(21):00357-5. doi:10.1016/j.japh.2021.08.016.

World Health Organization . Communicating risk in public health emergencies: a WHO guideline for emergency risk communication (ERC) policy and practice. https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789241550208. Updated January 10, 2018. Accessed October 27, 2021.

A complete list of our mask posts can be found at the Dear Pandemic website: https://dearpandemic.org/category/masks/

Han PK Reeve BB Moser RP Klein WM . Aversion to ambiguity regarding medical tests and treatments: measurement, prevalence, and relationship to sociodemographic factors. J Health Commun. 2009;14(6):556-572. doi:10.1080/10810730903089630.

Han PKJ Scharnetzki E Scherer AM , et al. Communicating scientific uncertainty about the COVID-19 pandemic: Online experimental study of an uncertainty-normalizing strategy. J Med Internet Res . 2021;23(4):e27832. doi:10.2196/27832.

SPJ code of ethics . Society of professional journalists. website. https://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp https://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp. Updated September 6, 2014. Accessed October 27, 2021.

A complete list of our “information hygiene” posts can be found at the Dear Pandemic website: https://dearpandemic.org/category/uncertainty-and-misinformation/.

A nice lay summary: Belham FS . How images and imagination can enhance learning. The Learning Scientists website. https://www.learningscientists.org/blog/2018/3/28-1. n.d. Accessed October 27, 2021.

Rawson KA Thomas RC Jacoby LL . The power of examples: illustrative examples enhance conceptual learning of declarative concepts. Educ Psychol Rev. 2015;27:483-504.

A terrific exposition of the power of analogy and the importance of chunking can be found. In: Boser U , ed. Learn Better . New York, NY: Penguin Random House LLC; 2017.

Barkley EF Major CH . Interactive Lecturing: A Handbook for College Faculty. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2018.

Mar RA Li J Nguyen ATP Ta CP . Memory and comprehension of narrative versus expository texts: a meta-analysis. Psychon Bull Rev. 2021;28(3):732-749. doi:10.3758/s13423-020-01853-1.

Nutbeam D Lloyd JE . Understanding and responding to health literacy as a social determinant of health. Annu Rev Public Health. 2021;42:159-173. doi:10.1146/annurev-publhealth-090419-102529.

Eysenbach G . Infodemiology and infoveillance: framework for an emerging set of public health informatics methods to analyze search, communication and publication behavior on the internet. J Med Internet Res. 2009;11(1):e11. doi:10.2196/jmir.1157.