Dr. Sherry Pagoto, SBM President-elect and KB Collaborator, was a co-presenter for a Behavioral Informatics and Technology Panel Discussion on social media health promotion at the 39^th Annual Meeting and Scientific Sessions of the Society of Behavioral Medicine, April 11-14, 2018 in New Orleans, Louisiana. Dr. Pagoto shared methodological challenges related to participant recruitment, intervention content development, and intervention delivery for a Facebook intervention targeting mothers of teen daughters in order to reduce the incidence of indoor tanning. This project is currently being conducted by KB and several collaborators from the University of Connecticut, East Tennesee State University, and Colorado State University.

Social media platforms can be used to deliver health promotion interventions to wide audiences without the barriers that plague traditionally-delivered programs, such as geography, transportation, scheduling, and childcare. Because most people access their social media feeds daily, health programming can be delivered to populations who are not necessarily seeking help or are motivated to change. Despite these promising and unique features, designing studies to evaluate social media-delivered interventions involves methodological challenges for recruitment and participation. During the panel discussion, Dr. Pagoto shared some of our research project’s challenges, implications of alternative recruitment and engagement methods, and valuable lessons learned.

This research project is called “Likes Pins and Views: Engaging Moms on Teen Indoor Tanning Thru Social Media.” It is funded by a grant from the National Cancer Institute (RO1CA192652; Dr. David Buller, KB, Principal Investigator). Collaborators include Dr. Barbara Walkosz and Julia Berteletti from KB, Dr. Sherry Pagoto, Jessica Oleski, and Ashley Panzarino from the University of Connecticut, Dr. Katie Baker and Dr. Joel Hillhouse from East Tennessee State University, and Dr. Kim Henry from Colorado State University.