A qualitative examination of affect and ideology within mass media interventions to increase HIV testing with gay men garnered from a systematic review

Abstract

Objectives. Increasing appropriate HIV testing among men who have sex with men (MSM) is crucial to HIV prevention. Mass media interventions are effective in promoting testing, but to date, there has been little examination of their active content. Design. We conducted a qualitative analysis of intervention materials (n = 69) derived from a systematic review of mass media interventions designed to improve testing with MSM. Methods. Visual data were analysed for their affective and ideological content using a novel method drawing on concepts from semiotics (i.e., broadly speaking, the analysis of signs). Results. Whilst affect was not explicitly theorized or examined in any of the studies, there are clearly identifiable affective elements implicitly at play in these interventions. Four thematic categories of affect/ideology were identified including (1) sexual desire and the 'pornographication' of the gay/bisexual male subject; (2) narratives of romance and love; (3) fear, threat, and regret; and (4) 'flattened' affect. Conclusions. This is the first study to examine and detail the affective and ideological aspects of intervention content in this field. Using analytic techniques such as those reported here, in addition to approaches that focus on the manner in which intervention This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Body Dissatisfaction, Cognitive Distraction, and Sexual Satisfaction in a Sample of LGB+ People: A Mediation Study Framed by Cognitive Psychology Models of Sexual Response

“…Our results are in line and are supported by studies indicating that the gay male subculture places great importance on physical appearance, which can lead to a perceived gap between their actual body image and their desired body shape [55]. This gay subculture often promotes the idea that self-worth is tied to a specific aesthetic [56]. Research suggests that gay men base their worth on physical appearance more than heterosexual people [57].…”

Mass media and communication interventions to increase HIV testing among gay and other men who have sex with men: Social marketing and visual design component analysis

“…As previously stated, the current findings suggest that none of the interventions involved in the study explicitly attempted to address fear of a positive HIV test result, which is surprising given previous evidence suggesting that fear of the result may result in avoidance of testing ( Deblonde et al, 2010 ; Flowers et al, 2013a ; Lui et al, 2018 ). Whilst the current findings do consider the overall tone of the content, a more detailed discussion of affect within these interventions can be found in Langdridge et al (2020) .…”

“…The current paper is part of a series of papers presenting findings from a systematic review exploring evidence related to mass media and communication interventions to increase HIV testing among GBMSM. More detailed analysis relating to intervention effectiveness (McDaid et al, 2019), the active content of interventions (Flowers et al, 2019) and affect used within interventions (Langdridge et al, 2020) can be found elsewhere. The current analyses employed rigorous data extraction tools to attempt to identify the common social marketing principles and visual design elements associated with effectiveness across a range of HIV testing campaigns.…”

“…The current paper is part of a series of papers presenting findings from a systematic review exploring evidence related to mass media and communication interventions to increase HIV testing among GBMSM. More detailed analysis relating to intervention effectiveness ( McDaid et al, 2019 ), the active content of interventions ( Flowers et al, 2019 ) and affect used within interventions ( Langdridge et al, 2020 ) can be found elsewhere.…”