Technology-Based Interventions for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention and Treatment

Abstract

Technology evolves at a rapid pace, providing opportunities for health communication and health promotion, disease prevention, and treatment efforts. Technology-based interventions allow health communicators to take advantage of opportunities presented by various platforms, such as increased appeal, interactivity, ability to tailor, and convenience. Research has found that such interventions can be effective, particularly if best practices in intervention development and implementation are followed. However, there are still challenges related to intervention development and dissemination. Additionally, although effective interventions may be developed, the understanding of the mechanisms that lead to effects are less well known, and research has determined that many interventions may not be grounded in communication and behavior change theory. Finally, there is a need to move research and practice in technology-based interventions forward, considering opportunities to gather data to provide more robust and adaptive interventions and further examine how the affordances of the technology can best be leveraged to enhance health communication and health promotion, disease prevention, and treatment efforts.