"If it has an exclamation point, I step away from it, I need facts, not excited feelings": Technologically Mediated Parental COVID Uncertainty

TL;DR

This study explores how social media influences parental uncertainty during COVID-19, proposing new theoretical components and design recommendations to help parents manage health-related ambiguity.

Contribution

It introduces new components to Mishel's Uncertainty in Illness theory to account for social media's role in mediating health uncertainty among parents.

Findings

Social media moderates parental uncertainty about COVID-19.

New theoretical components explain technology's influence on uncertainty.

Design recommendations support parents in coping with health ambiguity.

Abstract

As a novel virus, COVID introduced considerable uncertainty into the daily lives of people all over the globe since late 2019. Relying on twenty-three semi-structured interviews with parents whose children contracted COVID, we analyzed how the use of social media moderated parental uncertainty about the symptoms, prognosis, long-term potential health ramifications of infection, vaccination, and other issues. We framed our findings using Mishel's Uncertainty in Illness theory. We propose new components to the theory that account for technological mediation in uncertainty. We also propose design recommendations to help parents cope with health uncertainty using social media.