Achievements

社会情報研究 3, 1, 13-21 (2021)
Acceptability of humorous expressions in public health communication

Author

Machi SUKA Junji HASHIMOTO

Category

Public Communications with Media Studies

Abstract

The Ministry of Health, Labour, and Welfare developed a humor appeal poster to enlighten the public on Advance Care Planning (ACP), which is an epoch-making experience in public health communication in Japan. In order to examine whether the ACP poster was acceptable for the intended audience, we analyzed the Yahoo Japan News comments and conducted questionnaire surveys with graduate students and office workers, respectively. Our results suggest that part of the audience can feel uncomfortable receiving the aggressive humor message and their negative emotions may hinder the effect of humor on persuasion. However, it is certain that the ACP poster was successful in attracting much attention from the public. Further studies are needed to find the best way of using humor appeal in public health communication.
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