| Description |
Young adult cancer caregivers' (YACC) ability to thrive is enhanced when they feel socially supported. Social media (SM) is an important source of support for young adults yet little is known about how YACCs use SM during cancer caregiving. The purpose of this convergent mixed methods study was to illuminate factors associated with YACCs' use of, and social support received from, SM during the first six months of caregiving. In Aim 1, we interviewed YACCs (n=34) to describe their use of SM. We applied grounded theory coding methods (κ=0.88), which yielded key insights about perceptions and patterns of use: 1) YACCs primarily used SM to provide updates about the cancer patient as this was less burdensome than other communication strategies; 2) YACCs perceived SM as enabling access to social support they would not otherwise have accessed; 3) YACCs experienced negative consequences from posting online including misinformation and uncomfortable responses; 4) While negative experiences led some YACCs to avoid posting about cancer, most thought potential benefits outweighed harms. In Aim 2, we examined responses to YACCs' SM posts (n=2093) for prevalence of five types of functional social support-emotional, information, validation, companionship, instrumental-and how prevalence changed over the first six months of caregiving. Coding for support type (κ=0.95) was quantified to calculate prevalence; iii changes in prevalence over time were compared using linear regression modeling. Emotional and information support were the most prevalent support types; information (adjusted odds ratio (aOR): 1.15, 95% Confidence Interval (CI) 1.09-1.21) and companionship (aOR: 1.12, 95%CI 1.02-1.24) significantly increased in prevalence over time while emotional decreased (aOR: 0.90, 95%CI 0.85-0.94). Aim 3 examined the effects of SM platform and presence/absence of cancer-related content on support using linear mixed effects regression modeling. Instagram posts had more emotional support responses than Facebook posts (β=0.25, standard error (SE)=0.09, p=0.007). Cancer-related content was associated with more validation support (β=0.20, SE=0.07, p=0.002), but less emotional (β=-0.17, SE=0.07, p=0.02) and instrumental (β=-0.06, SE=0.02, p=0.001) support compared to posts without cancer-related content. Study findings yield insight into the use of SM for social support among YACCs, including future directions for SM-based support interventions. iv |
