Pooja Ichplani

Background/Objectives: This study examines the effectiveness of calorie labeling on restaurant menus by investigating how visual attention is allocated between calorie information and food cues. Although calorie labeling policies are widely implemented, prior research suggests limited impact on reducing energy intake. Methods: Using eye-tracking technology, this study explored how menu design factors (specifically visual food cues) influence attention. Results: Results from a within-subject experiment (N = 82) indicated that calorie labels received significantly fewer visual fixations (in terms of frequency and duration) when food images were present. Conversely, calorie labels did not reduce attention to food cues, highlighting an asymmetry in attentional allocations. Interestingly, restricted eaters were associated with more frequent attention to calorie labels but not with longer sustained attention to those labels. Conclusions: Overall, findings suggest that the motivational responses elicited by food cues undermine the effectiveness of calorie labeling by diverting attention away from nutritional information, limiting its utility as a public health intervention.

Intimate partner violence (IPV) affects one in three women in the United States, with lesser women reporting it or seeking support from services. Yet, most IPV research attempts to understand abuse after an episode of violence. This exploratory work is driven by the need for a network‐based entry point to IPV prevention that underscores the role of women's perceived social support. Therefore, we ask “who women will likely talk to?” in the future to understand their willingness for disclosure of abuse to advance research line that preemptively addresses the gaps in IPV interventions. To do so, we draw from the help‐seeking frameworks for survivors of abuse to explore the structural network effects on the relationship between social support, mental health, and (willingness for) disclosure. The cross‐sectional survey results found partial support for the effects of the number of female interpersonal network ties (INTs), and lasting effects of respondent perceptions for an IPV‐tailored social support found a greater statistical support for predicting willingness for disclosure. Moderating effects of IPV stigma were also significant. The implications of these findings for theoretical advancement, future research, and IPV network interventions are discussed, while considering the limitations of the current undertaking.

As user-generated content (UGC) increasingly shapes the digital communication landscape, this study explored how message creators may persuade themselves to engage in healthier activities. In an online experiment, participants (N = 404) were asked to select a topic (healthy eating or exercising) and view a screenshot from a fictitious health organization. Afterward, participants were randomly assigned (based on topic) to: (a) create a video, (b) watch a video, or (c) a control group, and answer a questionnaire. A mediation analysis showed that message-creation was associated with more positive attitudes, self-identity, and self-efficacy. In turn, these variables were associated with greater intentions to adopt healthy practices. Merely watching a video (or doing nothing) was less influential. The data suggest specific mechanisms by which self-persuasion may affect behavior in digital health contexts, particularly via self-efficacy. Results also suggest recommendations for practitioners to leverage the persuasive influence of UGC in health-promotion campaigns.

There is urgent need to consider prevailing environmental problems within the larger cultural contexts to effectively progress towards climate change impact reduction. However, national agenda to mollify the climate change rarely frames the crises from the diverse perspectives and experiences that India is home to. Shifting attention from the United Nations’ focus on perpetrators of climate change to climate change victims, this qualitative content analysis uses a constructivist paradigmatic approach to examine the participatory video narratives produced by local media producers in rural India. Based on the levels of analyses for the impact, findings from twenty primary issue videos are thematically presented: individual, family and community, and spatial. The videos depict an intertwined nature of agriculture and environment, and documents agentative social action, transformative collective potential, and present a starting point to catalyse an iterative process of communication that expands our understanding of climate change impact beyond what is portrayed in globally dominant narratives.