Feeling less alone online: patients' ambivalent engagements with digital media.
Digital media
Facebook
chronic illness
emotions
loneliness
patients
Journal
Sociology of health & illness
ISSN: 1467-9566
Titre abrégé: Sociol Health Illn
Pays: England
ID NLM: 8205036
Informations de publication
Date de publication:
07 2020
07 2020
Historique:
received:
20
10
2019
revised:
22
04
2020
accepted:
27
04
2020
pubmed:
12
6
2020
medline:
19
8
2021
entrez:
12
6
2020
Statut:
ppublish
Résumé
Digital media offer the chronically ill, especially those who experience related isolation, unparalleled opportunities to connect with others. This article asks, how do these individuals ascribe meaning to and use these media to manage their condition and related isolation? Using the concepts of affordance and emotional community, and drawing on the findings from an Australian study on patients' use of digital media, we examine individuals' ambivalent ascriptions of media, which are both feared and distrusted for the risks they present and embraced as invaluable tools of social connection. We argue that this ambivalence is explicable in terms of the communities to which the chronically ill belong which are founded on strong emotional bonds. In a context in which individuals tend to feel isolated through pain and/or stigmatisation, digital media may offer powerful means for sharing and affirming their experiences, the subjective benefits of which may outweigh the perceived risks. The article discusses the functions and features of digital media that the chronically ill value and distrust and concludes by considering the implications of our analysis for strategies to address the needs of people who feel isolated as a consequence of their condition.
Identifiants
pubmed: 32525577
doi: 10.1111/1467-9566.13117
doi:
Types de publication
Journal Article
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Langues
eng
Sous-ensembles de citation
IM
Pagination
1441-1455Informations de copyright
© 2020 Foundation for the Sociology of Health & Illness.
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