Health-Related Self-Efficacy Cultivated in the Ecosystems of Information and Communications Technologies

Abstract

This systematic literature review is an exploration of individual and socially cultivated health-related self-efficacy (HRSE), effected in the environments of information and communication technology (ICT). This exploration approaches ICT as a digitally living and highly fluid ecosystem of interconnected and often integrated devices and systems - not as disparate or segregated components. Further, the ICT ecosystem is an omni-present, persistent, and often invasive environment and entity that provides access and exposure to overwhelming content, influence, and perception manipulation. The ICT ecosystem is an underestimated variable of human influence and perception manipulation fully interwoven into the social fabric of Western civilization. While it provides access and exposure to all forms of information and media, it observes, collects, and analyzes individual and social activity to craft and curate interest, engagement, influence, perception, belief, and other behaviors. How technology, commerce, and other entities use the ICT ecosystem to manipulate health-related beliefs and behaviors, and ultimately HRSE, is a matter of significant individual and social concern.