Differences Between Races in Health Information Seeking and Trust Over Time: Evidence From a Cross-Sectional, Pooled Analyses of HINTS Data

Purpose: Assessed racial disparities in health information-seeking behavior and trust of information sources from 2007 to 2017. Design: Pooled cross-sectional survey data. Setting: Health Information National Trends Survey (HINTS). Participation: Data included 6 iterations of HINTS (pooled: N = 19 496; 2007: n = 3593; 2011: n = 3959; 2013: n = 3185; Food and Drug Administration [FDA] 2015: n = 3738; 2017: n = 3285; and FDA 2017: n = 1736). Measures: Outcome variables were health information seeking, high confidence, and high trust of health information from several sources. Independent variable was race group, controlling for other sociodemographic and socioeconomic variables. Analysis: Weighted descriptive and multivariate logistic regression for the pooled sample assessed associations by race. Fully interacted models with race–survey year interactions compared differences in outcomes between years. Results: Black respondents, relative to white, had greater odds of having high confidence in their ability to attain health information, trust of health information from newspapers and magazines, radio, internet, television, government, charitable organizations, and religious organizations. Hispanic respondents, relative to white, had lower odds of seeking health information and trusting health information from doctors. They had higher odds of trusting health information from the radio, the internet, television, charitable organizations, and religious organizations. Conclusion: Disparities between races in trust of information sources remained across time. Understanding optimal information media, their reach, and credibility among racial groups could enable more targeted approaches to developing interventions. Our analytical approach minimized limitations present in the HINTS.