Online Psychology & Social Marketing

The psychological architecture of online intervention proved to be a key component of persuasive websites. In our study, the most effective psychological architecture are goal-directed websites. These websites inform users about the consequences of their behaviour, prompt them to set goals, then encourage them to track their progress toward those goals while providing feedback on their performance.

Within the fields of e-health and persuasive technology, research indicates that intervention websites can motivate people to adopt healthy behaviours, such as quitting smoking, exercising more, and eating better. Frequently, these online interventions are individually tailored programmes, resembling two-way interpersonal therapy. It is now conceivable that health campaigners can deploy mass-interpersonal campaigns, where online media are used to engage large populations in automated personal relationships, similar to relationships people have with their doctors, councillors, trainers, and trusted friends.

If you were trying to identify the factors that could explain why a given online health intervention works, its efficacy may be attributed to source credibility, ingenious tailoring algorithms, argument quality, the vividness of imagery used, fear appeals or how audiences relate to the communication style. All or some of these factors may account for the intervention’s effectiveness or ineffectiveness; however, when trying to describe interventions, there is no comprehensive way of conceptualizing the many factors, nor a universal taxonomy of influence effects appropriate to the design of online behavioural change interventions.