HIV/AIDS stigma in Chinese Internet forums: a content analysis approach

Abstract

This study examines the stigmatization of HIV/AIDS and people living with HIV/AIDS (PLHA) on three popular Chinese Internet forums. A corpus of 275 entries discussing AIDS and PLHA was coded, based on a scheme of five stigmatizing behaviors. A high percentage of postings showed at least one and often several stigmatizing behaviors. These findings suggest that participants openly revealed their fears and biases about AIDS and PLHA online. In addition, when sexual behaviors were identified in the entries, a higher likelihood to stigmatize, a greater absence of empathy, and more intense negative emotions were shown. Further investigation of the five variables of stigmatization shows that labeling, negative attribution, and responsibility were the most frequent stigmatizing behaviors in these messages. Implications of this tendency to feel free to stigmatize HIV/AIDS and PLHA in online forums are discussed. The study also provides suggestions to health practitioners and policy makers for how to address online AIDS stigmatizing behavior.

Keywords:

• HIV/AIDS in China
• HIV/AIDS stigmatization
• Internet discussion forums in China
• interaction on Internet forums
• conceptualization of stigma

Notes

^1. The codebook was developed and the coding was implemented in Chinese. For the requirements of this manuscript, the categories in the codebook were translated into English as accurately as possible. The codebook is available in Chinese from the first author upon request.