Medical Decision Making in Relative Risk Scenarios: Understanding the Challenges of Communicating Alternative Health

Abstract

Due to well-being movements and the COVID-19 pandemic, the exclusive use of alternative health (AH) treatments has been increasing even for serious and life-threatening conditions. This phenomenon raises critical questions about why and how people avoid conventional medicine for serious illnesses, giving us a unique empirical context to investigate relative risk perceptions in health communication. While previous research has explored factors such as socio-demographic characteristics, health beliefs, and personal experiences, limited attention has been given to the role of health information exposure in an increasingly complex media exposure environment. This study addresses this gap by examining AH media as a key source of health information and its role in shaping medical decision-making through a survey of N = 1,020 individuals in Singapore, a country where AH is widely used. Drawing from the orientation-stimulus-reasoning-orientation-response model, we investigated 1) the mechanism in the relationship between AH media usage and willingness to use AH versus conventional treatments by probing the (serial) mediating roles of risk-benefit perceptions of AH versus conventional treatments and belief in AH-related misinformation, and 2) the moderating role of individuals' critical consuming literacy (CCL) on this relationship. Our findings revealed serial mediation pathways linking AH media use to increased willingness to use AH treatments but reduced willingness to use conventional treatments in serious illness contexts. CCL moderated the relationship between AH media usage and risk perceptions of both AH and conventional health treatments. Theoretical and practical implications for the communicative dynamics of medical decision-making under relative risk scenarios are discussed.