Using Social Media to Determine the Affective and Cognitive Components of Tweets about Sunburn

Abstract

Background: The relationship between social media usage and the public’s expressions of sunburn remains unexplored. This study is a content analysis of Twitter that was performed to identify the public’s expressions, perceptions, and attitudes towards sunburn. Methods: Qualitative content analysis was conducted on tweets by Australian Twitter users during January 2007 and January 2016. Out of 2,000 tweets available, in-depth content analysis of 200 random tweets was performed. Results: Tweets in this study were categorised into 10 distinct themes, three of which were cognitive (fact based) and seven affective (emotional), while one was miscellaneous. Results reveal that tweets about sunburn overwhelmingly contained affective as opposed to cognitive components. In addition, the sentiments contained in the affective tweets were frequently positively (68.9%) rather than negatively valanced (31.1%). While humour was the most common theme (n = 68 tweets), many tweets also expressed a link between Australian national identity and sunburn (n = 25 tweets). Conclusion: Many of the tweets analysed contained positive affective sentiments such as joy, rather than worry or concern, suggesting an avenue for further health promotion research.