Internet use is considered a lever for empowering patients, levelling inequalities and reducing healthcare expenditure. However, with digital inclusion, health provision quality and health system efficiency high on the UK and EU policy agendas, we need to better understand the relationship between Internet use and health outcomes to assess potential benefits and adverse effects. This research addresses the question of how Internet use influences individuals' health service use and their perceived health in the context of England. Focusing on health information-seeking, it analyses variations across different kinds of users, mechanisms between Internet use and both health outcomes, and the role of individual and contextual factors in this relationship. To answer this question, this research uses a mixed methods approach. Quantitative data from the Oxford Internet Surveys (OxIS), the English census and Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) was connected through spatial microsimulation based on output areas. Qualitative data was collected through semi-structured, face-to-face interviews, primarily with former OxIS participants from output areas in the quantitative strand. The quantitative data was revisited based on emerging interview themes. The results indicate that Internet use influences perceived health and health service use via various mechanisms based on the Internet's content, mediation and connection affordances. However, the boundaries between users and non-users are blurry and outcomes vary for different types of individuals, classified here as learners, pragmatists, sceptics, worriers, delegators and adigitals. Age, education, socioeconomic status, long-term health conditions, and geographic context influence Internet use and health outcomes separately, while the social context shapes their relationship too. These findings advance the theoretical understanding of Internet-based health outcomes, and provide practical implications for health professionals and policymakers with insights down to the local level. Moreover, this research demonstrates how novel insights for public wellbeing can be derived from qualitatively enriched secondary data in privacy-preserving and cost-effective ways.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-12-23T14:33:43Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao de Eduardo Rocha Monteiro.pdf: 2785467 bytes, checksum: 577f7503c72e792b907de5a0eb99ec58 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009-06-19 / Dentro do conjunto de transformações ocasionados pela evolução da internet, há uma que nada tem a ver com tecnologias de processamento e apresentacão de informaçãoes, mas nem por isso é menos importante do que as outras mudanças: É a transformação do comportamento do usuário perante a Internet. Se antes ele era um mero consumidor de informacão, agora ele participa ativamente, avaliando e criando conteúdo na web. Este cenário estimulou o desenvolvimento de novas tecnologias para apoiar a coletividade na web, que hoje possibilitam um amplo mecanismo de interação para diversos indivíduos, favorecendo a consolidacão de importantes espaços virtuais que promovemconstrução e socialização de conhecimento. Neste contexto, destacam-se as redes sociais virtuais. Redes sociais virtuais são espaços virtuais que incluem uma estrutura feita por indivíduos e organizações conectados por um ou mais tipos de interdependência, como valores, visões, idéias, amizade ou interesses comerciais. Este trabalho realizou um estudo sobre o estado da arte sobre as redes sociais virtuais e sobre os sistemas de recomendação, com o objetivo de criar uma rede social virtual que permite a publicação de conteúdo por usuários comuns, e um sistema de recomendação, para dirigir informações relevantes para os usuários. Também foi realizado um estudo sobre os agregadores de notícias sociais, que compõem uma categoria específica de redes sociais virtuais. Como produto principal deste trabalho, foi desenvolvido o sistema RSN: Rede Social de Notícias. RSN agrega características dos agregadores de notócias sociais a outras características de redes sociais virtuais com o objetivo de construir um espaço virtual com alto potencial de exibição de notícias interessantes aos seus usuários / Within the set of transformations from the evolution of the Internet, there is one that has nothing to do about processing and presenting information, but no less important than the other changes: the transformation of the behavior of the Internet User. If before it was a mere consumer of information, now he actively participates, evaluating and creating content in the web. This scenario has stimulated the development of new technologies to support the community on the web, which now enables a broad mechanism of interaction for many people, which promotes the formation of important virtual spaces with respect to the construction and socialization of knowledge. In this context, the virtual social networks stands out. Virtual social networks are virtual spaces that include a structure made by individuals and organizations connected by one or more types of interdependency, such as values, visions, ideas, friendship or business interests. This work conducted a study on the state of the art on virtual social networks and on the recommender systems, in order to create a virtual social network which enables content share by users, and a recommendation systemto direct relevant information for its users. Was also a study on the social news aggregators, that constitute a specific category of virtual social networks. The system RSN: Social Networking News was develop as the main product of this work. RSN adds features of social news aggregators to other characteristics of virtual social networks in order to build a virtual space with a high potential display of interesting news to its users