Coping with cultural differences in healthcare: Chinese immigrant mothers’ health information sharing via WeChat |
| |
| Institution: | 1. Department of Communication Studies, Kutztown University of Pennsylvania, 15200 Kutztown Rd, Kutztown, PA, 19530, USA;2. Department of Communication Studies, California State University, Long Beach, 1250 Bellflower Blvd, Long Beach, CA, 90840, USA;1. Faculty of Education, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia;2. University College of Teacher Education Styria, Graz, Austria |
| |
| Abstract: | Immigrants face the challenge of obtaining culturally specific health information and adapting to a new healthcare system. Through qualitative content analysis, this study explores how Chinese immigrant mothers use the ethnic social media—WeChat to engage in health information sharing and coping with cultural differences in healthcare between the U.S. and China. Based on the data collected from one WeChat group in a metropolitan city in the northeastern U.S., Chinese immigrant mothers frequently discuss the topics of “doctors and hospitals,” “insurance and cost,” “medicine and treatment,” and “alternative health care.” They constantly compare Chinese health care beliefs and practices with western ones. They adopt various acculturation strategies to manage the cultural differences in healthcare beliefs, practices, and systems. We call for future research to further examine immigrants’ health information sharing via social media and consider acculturation as coping strategies or processes in the health communication context. |
| |
| Keywords: | Health information sharing Acculturation Social media Chinese immigrant WeChat |
| 本文献已被 ScienceDirect 等数据库收录！ |
|
