Research has suggested that social media usage increases during times of social isolation. However, rather than making users feel more connected to others, social media may cause negative mental health and relational outcomes, including a fear of missing out (FoMO). Against the backdrop of the global coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic, this health communication study sought to understand the impact of physical and emotional isolation (i.e., prescribed social isolation) on people as we turned to social media more frequently. As the pandemic wore on, many remained online, watching people they knew “returning to normal,” potentially creating high levels of FoMO despite disagreeing with others’ decisions. This study examines whether social media use (frequency and purpose) influences individuals’ perception of the acceptability of others’ behavior, and whether those perceptions impact individuals’ own behavioral decisions. Participants ( N = 459) from the United States were recruited from late 2021 to early 2022 to complete an anonymous online survey regarding the “acceptableness” of behavior shown in posts by friends and family. Results indicated that increased social media frequency was correlated with an increased sense of FoMO, which was significantly and positively associated with favorable perceptions of others’ behaviors, such as gathering indoors with others, even when public health officials discouraged it. However, FoMO was not significantly related to users’ personal intentions to follow public health recommendations. A post hoc analysis determined that fear of COVID-19 moderated the relationship between FoMO and the perception of others’ behavior, as well as the relationship between FoMO and behavioral intentions.

Objective: To identify how and why infertility patients' communication with health care providers relates to their continuity of care within infertility treatment. Method: A grounded theory analysis was conducted for 25 in-depth interviews across three coding phases, where we remained open to all themes present in the data, narrowed to most prominent themes, and found the connections between the themes. Results: Based on our identified themes, we created a conceptual model that explains why infertility patients (dis)continued care with one or more clinician. Through this model, we describe two infertility identity transitions for patients:

This article is a systematic methodological literature review with the goal of understanding how and why health communication researchers are using mixed methods research (MMR) to better understand interpersonal communication between diabetes patients, their loved ones, and health care professionals. First, we provide a brief overview of MMR, followed by a discussion of the appropriateness of using MMR in health research. We then explain our search procedures for identifying MMR studies about interpersonal diabetes communication and describe our analysis of the identified studies. We then offer a brief, quantitative summary of our findings and provide details of exemplar studies to illustrate the unique value added by using MMR. We conclude the article with a discussion of implications and recommendations for the use of MMR in diabetes communication research.

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