Abstract
People’s accessibility to nutrition information is now near universal due to internet access, and the information available varies in its scientific integrity and provider expertise. Understanding the information-seeking behaviours of the public is paramount for providing sound nutrition advice. This research aims to identify who learners in a nutrition-focused Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) turn to for nutrition information, and how they discuss the information they find. A multi-methods approach explored the information-seeking and sharing behaviours of MOOC learners. Summative content analysis, and an exploratory, inductive, qualitative approach analysed learners’ posts in MOOC discussion forums. From 476 posts, the majority (58.6%) of nutrition information sources learners reported were from websites. Providers of nutrition information were most commonly (34%) tertiary educated individuals lacking identifiable nutrition qualifications; 19% had no identifiable author information, and only 5% were from nutrition professionals. Qualitative themes identified that learners used nutrition information to learn, teach and share nutrition information. Consistent with connectivist learning theory, learners contributed their own sources of nutrition information to discussions, using their own knowledge networks to teach and share information. Nutrition professionals need to understand the principles of connectivist learning behaviours in order to effectively engage the public.
Highlights
Nutrition is a popular topic—there are umpteen websites, social media pages and books dedicated to food and eating, culinary skills, and the science of nutrition
This included (i) a summative content analysis to categorise the sources of nutrition information and the vocational backgrounds of its providers from online conversations [27]; and (ii) an exploratory, inductive, qualitative approach to analyse learners’ posts in discussion forums throughout the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), to explore how people used information they found on social media
There were 62,144 (May 2016), 12,468 (March 2017), and 6738 (February 2018) people who registered for the three runs of the MOOC, from 197, 171 and 156 countries respectively
Summary
Nutrition is a popular topic—there are umpteen websites, social media pages and books dedicated to food and eating, culinary skills, and the science of nutrition. Near-universal access to the internet, sophisticated search engines plus widespread adoption of social media underpins the public’s access to information about food and health, and the public are increasingly turning to the internet for information [1]. Social media and ‘expert’ websites can be written by anyone, regardless of their expertise [2]. They can effectively influence their online followers and nutrition professionals need to acknowledge and compete in this space to be heard [3]
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