Perceived effectiveness of messages to address cervical cancer screening barriers: An online experiment.

ABSTRACT:

Introduction

Cervical cancer is almost entirely preventable through vaccination and screening, but screening rates still lag targets. Communication campaigns can encourage screening; however, the types of message content that are most effective are unknown.

Methods

We conducted an online randomized experiment testing messages within four themes aligned with previously identified screening barriers: cancer fatalism, inconvenience, lack of knowledge about risk factors, and unawareness of screening guidelines. A national convenience sample of US participants aged 21-65 years and assigned female at birth (n = 1,536) viewed one of three messages from each theme assigned at random and one control message in random order. We measured perceived effectiveness to encourage cervical ca

SUBMITTER: Halvorson-Fried SM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12617949 | biostudies-literature | 2025

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature