Language style and recognition of the answers in health Q&A community: Moderating effects of medical terminology

Abstract

The rise of social question and answer (Q&A) platforms has changed the model of traditional health-information services. The quality of answers on a Q&A platform is critical to attract users and increase their community engagement. Thus, recognition of the answer was used to measure users’ acceptance of the answer. A theoretical model of the impact of language style on community recognition of health questions was developed. Nearly 1330 answers from a health question from Zhihu were obtained to verify the model. Results showed that personality reliability, assertiveness, argumentation clarity, commitment, and reverse incentive of health information positively affected answer recognition, while argumentation structure negatively affected answer acceptance. Simultaneously, the degree of use of medical terminology has a significant moderating effect on the relationship between answer recognition and assertiveness, argumentation structure, argumentation clarity, and commitment. Introducing Aristotle’s rhetoric theory to language style and answer recognition could potentially develop healthy communities and disseminate health knowledge.