This article examines the proposition that a popular form of entertainment, the telenovela, can educate Spanish-speaking viewers in the United States if accurate health information is presented in a dramatic, narrative format. Health professionals consulted on a breast cancer storyline in a Spanish-language telenovela, Ladrón de Corazones, and the impact on viewers' knowledge and behavioral intentions were assessed using three methods. First, an analysis of call attempts to 1-800-4-CANCER demonstrated a significant increase in calls when a PSA featuring the number aired during the program. Second, a nationwide telephone survey indicated that viewers, especially those who identify with Spanish-language television characters, gained specific knowledge from viewing the story and that male viewers were significantly more likely to recommend that women have a mammogram. Third, these trends were confirmed and further explored using focus groups of Ladrón viewers. Implications for educating viewers using dramatic serials in the United States are discussed.

You have an important message! Evaluating the effectiveness of a text message HIV/AIDS campaign in northwest Uganda

Communication infrastructure theory (CIT) offers an ecological approach to studying ways to reduce health disparities. The theory suggests that individuals' connections to a multi‐level storytelling system are enabled or constrained by the communication environment (a.k.a. communication action context). This article is a culmination of research to date that explores the potential of CIT to inform efforts directed at the reduction of health disparities. These studies have focused on geographic communities and/or ethnic groups known to experience health disparities. An argument is made for expanding the scope of this line of research, which to date has primarily focused on the relationship between integrated connections to the neighborhood storytelling network and health outcomes.

Combining key ideas from the knowledge-gap hypothesis and communication infrastructure theory, the present study aimed to explain the relations among individuals' education, access to community-based communication resources, and knowledge of chronic diseases (diabetes, hypertension, breast cancer, and prostate cancer) among African Americans and Latinos in Los Angeles. Rather than explore the effect of isolated communication resources, this study explored the effect of an integrated connection to community-based storytellers on chronic disease knowledge. The authors hypothesized that individuals' access to a community-based communication infrastructure for obtaining and sharing information functions as an intervening step in the process where social inequality factors such as education lead to chronic disease knowledge gaps in a local community context. With random samples of African Americans and Latinos in Los Angeles, the authors found that access to community-based communication resources plays a mediating role in the case of breast cancer and diabetes knowledge, but not in hypertension and prostate cancer knowledge. The authors discussed these findings on the basis of communication infrastructure theory and knowledge-gap hypothesis.

Civic engagement can impact politics, health outcomes, support for new policies, and the like. Research indicates that the communication infrastructure and the strength of the storytelling network, influences civic engagement outcomes. Recent community building initiatives place the impetus of community change and civic engagement on the family unit. This paper places the family unit within the storytelling network and explores how family interaction is related to civic engagement. A telephone survey of 739 new immigrant Latinos in Los Angeles was used to test the effect of family interaction on civic engagement. Regression analyses, controlling for sociodemographic factors, were used. Results indicate that family interaction leads to higher levels of civic engagement and encourages more integration into the neighborhood storytelling network.