Determining the influence of social marketing appeals in digital oral health promotion

Oral health impacts 3.5 billion people, requiring a shift to preventative strategies. Social marketing, using rational, humour, and fear appeals, effectively engages diverse audiences and drives behaviour change. Advances in digital technology and social media enhance this approach, making targeted health interventions, such as those for oral cancer, more impactful. Objectives: This study aims to identify the most appropriate social marketing appeal for enhancing knowledge, awareness, and practices related to oral cancer, with a focus on how sociodemographic factors influence these outcomes. Methods: Phase 1 focused on developing three digital oral health promotion (OHP) videos using rational, humour, and fear appeals, within a social marketing framework. It also involved creating and validating a questionnaire based on the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and Knowledge, Awareness, Practice (KAP) questionnaire on oral cancer to assess KAP immediately and six weeks post-exposure. Phase 2 comprised a three-arm randomized controlled trial with rational appeal as the control. Participants were selected through systematic sampling and then divided into twelve subgroups by gender, age, and education level using stratified random sampling. Data analysis included descriptive and inferential statistics such as one-way ANOVA, paired t-tests, chi-square tests, and regression analyses.