Tailoring Persuasive Health Messages to the Predominant Ego State of Patients

Lack of patient engagement has long been a problem in healthcare for chronic disease management. We report a study that explored the feasibility of applying Transactional Analysis theory to tailor health messages to the patient's predominant ego state, assuming that messages with a complementary communication approach will be better comprehended and efficacious in triggering the targeted health behaviours. These personalized health messages were constructed by field experts in co-creation workshops and tested by chronic disease patients with various predominant ego states via interviews and a survey. Our experiment did not support the hypothesized superiority of complementary communication but revealed a general patient preference for supportive and professional communication styles. Future studies should explore the long-term efficacy of complementary communication considering also situational and cultural factors.